George Miller wrote:Hey Patriarchal Gripe- I appreciate your kind words about my work. However, having said that, I think you underestimate the contribution that Don Bradley's work brings to the conversation. To be honest I have been somewhat disheartened by much of the response to Don's presentation.
Actually, I think most of the critics have taken the position that as far as the historical facts, they think Don got it right, or at least will suspend judgment pending further evidence. I myself was profuse in my praise in his historical work. So if this is merely a question of accepting Don's work as historian qua historian, I don't think Don has much to complain about. The critics are not on his case over that.
But the fact remains that Don also wanted this to be an apologetic, which is why he presented it at FAIR. If he had presented his findings at MHA or JWHA, none of this response would have happened, because there would not have been an apologetic aspect to it. Critics have tried to show Don the problems and implications of his apologetic, not his historical work. Don has resolutely refused to talk about this.
George Miller wrote:Don's presentation was indeed an academic game changer with regards to our understanding of the historical events surrounding the Kinderhook Plates episode. Sadly, it seems that everyone else on the field is playing an entirely different sport than Don. While Don is playing professional baseball, the participants on the boards are instead playing wiffle ball.
I think you have this wrong. It was Don who insisted on playing two sports at once: academic baseball and apologetic MMA. He also considers this presentation to have both academic and apologetic aspects. Critics don't have many problems with the former, and Don won't talk about the latter.
George Miller wrote:Watching the response on the boards has been thoroughly disheartening. Almost the only aspect of Don's fascinating discovery that has been discussed is if it has greater value as a pointy stick for apologists or the critics. In the meantime the audience seems completely blind to the wide reaching implications of Don's find and the understanding it can bring to Joseph Smith's religious narrative and how Joseph Smith's mind worked.
The problem most critics have pointed out is that Don's presentation has ignored how Joseph Smith's mind worked. He wants to treat the K-Hook episode as utterly unique, completely unlike any other translation project Joseph Smith engaged in. It was purely scholarly/academic has been the refrain. If Don wants to say this, he has to provide some reasons for doing this. The only reason has been that the facts viewed in the proper light don't require a revelatory explanation in this case. Seen in isolation, this works. As part of the overall pattern of Joseph Smith's translations, it doesn't work at all.
George Miller wrote:Personally, I found Don's work to be solid, intellectually honest, and erudite in its presentation. The implications and the light it sheds on many aspects of the Mormon experience were apparent to me 3 minutes into the presentation with further light incrementally shed throughout the presentation. I just wish both the critics and the apologists would take off their blinders and see the much larger picture that Don's findings reveal.
Again, I see it completely the opposite. Don has wanted to keep the conversations very narrow, while the critics have wanted to explore the larger picture. Time after time Don has said he only wants to focus on the narrow K-Hook episode, and only the historical aspects of that episode.
