Don Bradley's Kinderhook Bomb

[_onandagus]

Well Don, if I offended you I apologize, but I hardly see your "demonizing" accusation as anything but more of the same tired sensationalizing in poor attempts at answering criticism.

I meant as a broader thing from past posts, Thews, not something from this thread. But I should have accepted your apology, and should apologize myself for the snark.

Don

[_jon]

Don, forgive me if I'm slow on the uptake but I think what you are stating is:

A single character in the GAEL exactly matches a single character on the KP.

The translation Joseph made was simply expressing the meaning of that character as already established by GAEL.

Have I got that right?

[_onandagus]

Jon,

Yes.

This will be sooo much clearer when the video is up.

Don

[_onandagus]

So why is there a similiar character on the KP, which we know are fake?

Hey Again Harm,

See Chris Smith's response to this in the "Similar Symbols" thread.

Don

[_Doctor Scratch]

Don,

In your opinion, what was the nature of Joseph Smith's interpretation of the character from the GAEL? I.e., did he receive this knowledge via revelation?

Hi Scratch,

Do you mean the GAEL definition itself?

Yes, that's what I mean. Did he come by that definition via revelation, or some other means, in your view?

I'm still open on exactly what the GAEL is. My strong suspicion is that it was created for multiple purposes.

Get back with me on this one in a few years.... ;-)

by the way, regarding Joseph's KP translation as revelatory or nonrevelatory, see my response to Aristotle's interesting question on the other thread.

Don

Yeah, I saw that. But if both "translations"--i.e., the GAEL and the Kinderhook symbol--are coming from the same place--whether that be revelation, pure invention, or something else entirely--I'm not sure how/why it matters.

I get that believers want critics to acknowledge that Joseph Smith didn't pray over the Kinderhook Plates and ask God to help him translate them, and I have no problem conceding that point. Based on the evidence, it doesn't appear that he did that. After all, as your research helpfully points out, he wouldn't have needed to do that if he'd already received revelation (or whatever) for the familiar symbol.

[_Dad of a Mormon]

Jon,

Yes.

This will be sooo much clearer when the video is up.

Don

I can't wait. But in the meantime, is the GAEL available online and can you tell us what character you are referring to if it is?

[Guest]

I am not sure I understand the argument that Don's presentation destroys the "strong" critical argument against Joseph Smith based on the Kinderhook Plates translation. Don presents the "strong" critical argument as, essentially, "a true prophet would not be fooled into translating bogus plates." But I am not sure I follow the logical chain from "Joseph used the GAEL to 'translate' the KP" to "the KP translation therefore has no bearing on whether Joseph Smith was a fraud." Leaving aside the question of whether Don accurately presents the "strong" critical argument, and taking it at face value, I still don't see the significance of the finding about the character comparison (although I do find it interesting). Here's a summary of what we know:

1. The Kinderhook Plates were not ancient; they were a 19th-century creation.
2. The KP contained made-up characters that do not comport with any known actual language.
3. William Clayton says that Joseph Smith attempted to translate the characters and that he produced a partial translation, in which Joseph Smith said the KP were about the fellow with whom they were found and that "He was a descendant of Ham, through the loins of Pharaoh, King of Egypt, and that he received his Kingdom from the ruler of heaven and earth."
4. Don's presentation confirms that William Clayton was telling the truth, and that Joseph Smith actually did attempt a translation, and that this is what Joseph said the plates were about.
5. The translation Joseph produced was about the purportedly ancient skeleton with whom the KP were allegedly buried anciently and recently uncovered.
6. Because the characters on the KP were just gobbledygook, no "secular" translation was possible.
7. If Joseph Smith attempted a secular translation, he would have failed; he would be unable to produce anything other than gobbledygook. Any resulting English text would necessarily be fraudulent. That is, there is no way he could get the story about the "descendant of Ham" through a secular translation.
8. If Joseph Smith used revelation to translate the KP, he would have known that it was a hoax. That he produced a translation, again, shows that he was engaged in the act of deceiving his followers into believing he had the "gift" of translation. Whether he used "secular" means (i.e., consulting a lexicon, even a bogus one like the GAEL) or "revelatory" means to adduce the translation, the conclusion is the same: he pretended to translate something he could not, and he gave a translation that did not match what was on the plates. There is one out, I suppose: God could be a trickster, like Loki, or something along those lines.

The two principal foundations of the critical argument with respect to the KP are these: (1) Joseph Smith attempted a translation and what he produced was bogus, which shows he was a fraud; and (2) Joseph was tricked, did not have the spirit of discernment one would expect from a Prophet who speaks face to face with Jesus (as he claimed), etc. and this casts doubt on his prophetic claims (likewise, the church leaders who followed him who believed in and proclaimed the authenticity of the plates for over a century.

It seems Don solidified the critical arguments and severely weakened the chief apologetic argument, which has been in recent years that Clayton's account could not be trusted. As long as it was plausible that Joseph Smith did not actually say that the KP were about the descendant of Ham, etc., the apologist could maintain that Smith was not necessarily fooled by the hoax. But even a "secular" translation shows that Smith was engaged in fraud in deception.

[_jon]

So does the single character that's the same in GAEL and the KP mean this:
" he was a descendant of Ham through the loins of Pharaoh king of Egypt, and that he received his kingdom from the ruler of heaven and earth."

?

[_LDS truthseeker]

Wilbur Fugate claimed to have taken the KP letters froma Chinese Tea box. A Chinese fellow wrote me once and said many of the characters do match up with common Chinese names like 'tree'.

I suspect Fugate used some of the Chinese characters from the tea box and then modified some of the others.

Having one character from the KP match one from the GAEL sounds like mere coincidence.

I once examined the Anthon Manuscript against the Kinderhook Plates and also found that at least one charcter was an exact match. I mentioned it to Grant Palmer who dismissed it as a coincidence. I agreed.

[_Socrates]

Are the apologists at FAIR and NMI now in day three of wiping the egg off of their face for having for years doubted even disparaged Clayton and the accuracy of his journal entry, Clayton a confidante and scribe trusted by Joseph Smith, Jr.?

Is the silence by those apologists as thundering and deafening to other as it is to me?