Lars Nielsen's "How the Book of Mormon Came to Pass"

[mhansen94]

I read many of the comments on this topic, and I am astonished at the extremely vague nature of the conversation. Many commenters stated they have not even read Lars Nielsen's book. And those who have go on and on about whether John Smith ever met Solomon Spaulding, or whether Spaulding ever met Joseph Smith before the Book of Mormon was published, or whether Joseph Smith got the "concept" of reformed Egyptian, or the "idea" that Native Americans were descendants of Israelites, or got the name Nephi from somebody else, or whether any of Kircher's works were even in John Smith's library. But it's a VERY long way from "ideas and concepts read or heard somewhere" to 531 pages of 1,000 years of history, extremely complex, detailed storylines, parallel timelines with flashbacks, accurate geographical descriptions of Saudi Arabia, numerous Hebraisms such as chiasmus, and deep, detailed, religious discourses on almost every aspect of Christianity, from the Atonement to the resurrection, repentance, forgiveness, spiritual gifts, faith, baptism, and on and on. And the BIGGEST missing piece in this whole discussion is the fact that Joseph Smith dictated the entire Book to scribes in two months, without any notes, papers, manuscripts, or any reference material, which numerous of his scribes attested to, including his own wife! How did he do that?

[Kishkumen]

I read many of the comments on this topic, and I am astonished at the extremely vague nature of the conversation. Many commenters stated they have not even read Lars Nielsen's book. And those who have go on and on about whether John Smith ever met Solomon Spaulding, or whether Spaulding ever met Joseph Smith before the Book of Mormon was published, or whether Joseph Smith got the "concept" of reformed Egyptian, or the "idea" that Native Americans were descendants of Israelites, or got the name Nephi from somebody else, or whether any of Kircher's works were even in John Smith's library. But it's a VERY long way from "ideas and concepts read or heard somewhere" to 531 pages of 1,000 years of history, extremely complex, detailed storylines, parallel timelines with flashbacks, accurate geographical descriptions of Saudi Arabia, numerous Hebraisms such as chiasmus, and deep, detailed, religious discussions of almost every aspect of Christianity, from the Atonement to the resurrection, repentance, forgiveness, spiritual gifts, faith, baptism, and on and on. And the BIGGEST missing piece in this whole discussion is the fact that Joseph Smith dictated the entire Book to scribes in two months, without any notes, papers, manuscripts, or any reference material, which numerous of his scribes attested to, including his own wife! How did he do that?

I am not sure I understand the point of your post. Are you saying that Nielsen must be right because of the short time Smith took to produce the Book of Mormon or that the Book of Mormon must have been translated miraculously, ergo, Nielsen is wrong? How about, "none of the above?" Nielsen's book, in my opinion, is, albeit unintentionally, a printed gish gallop. In it, he piles up instance after instance of his own squinting to make things work out, but very little of it actually does. The Aben-nephi of Kircher is a fine example. If you squint, it looks like something must be going on, but, at our present level of knowledge, it could just as easily be and more likely is a coincidence. If you are saying the book must be a product of miraculous translation, then that is your subjective viewpoint, which is fine for you. No one is obliged to agree that the Book of Mormon must have been produced miraculously based on the facts we have.

[Physics Guy]

... the fact that Joseph Smith dictated the entire Book to scribes in two months, without any notes, papers, manuscripts, or any reference material, which numerous of his scribes attested to, including his own wife!

You write as if this "fact" were established with airtight certainty, as if Smith had been under twenty-four-hour video and audio surveillance for the entire previous ten years of his life, with a livestream followed constantly by a devoted audience of thousands of fans around the world.

What exactly would it have taken for Smith to have gotten in some time composing his text before those two months? What would it have taken for him to have gotten some help in composing the text? What would it have taken for him to have found opportunities at least every few days to make notes and consult them?

How many people would have had to lie afterwards, to produce the historical evidence that we have about Smith's composition process being shorter and without mortal assistance? How many people would have had to give misleading or incomplete statements? Who would these people have been? What could have been their motivations?

How many people would have had to have been duped by Smith or by others, to make the statements they did about the composition process without conscious deception on their part? What would Smith or others have to have done, to dupe these people in those ways?

Rethink all of those questions over at least several months, to see whether some easier ways occur to you over that time. Smith had years to think up whatever he did, and to enlist the sympathies of anyone whom he might have chosen as a confederate.

Then add up just how unlikely it really is that any one of those possible scenarios was what happened.

A conservative judgement might well be that the best scenario is still one that we could hardly expect to happen more than once, in all of New England, in a year. Somewhere in New England, though, at least every year or so, there probably was (and probably is) at least one case in which somebody either conceals an activity from friends and family for multiple months, or gets them to lie.

So if in 1829 the case was in Palmyra, then that's all it would take for Smith to have had much longer than two months to make up the Book of Mormon—or to have had secret help.

It is by absolutely no means whatever a fact that Smith had only two months or that he worked all by himself without notes.

[mhansen94]

I apologize for not being able to figure out how to reply to each post separately. The site lists them both when I click on Reply.

To Kishkumen - "Are you saying that Nielsen must be right?" Oh my gosh, no! He is completely wrong. My point was that whether or not someone (like John Smith) ever met someone else (like Spaulding), or whether the content or knowledge of Kirsher's works (all in Latin) ever made it to Joseph Smith (as Nielsen's book talks about) is laughably irrelevant. So Kirsher used the name Nephi (or did he?) and the words reformed Egyptian, and somehow those two tiny pieces of information snowballed through Spaulding to Smith into a complex 531-page book is ridiculous. Here's a quick video on the complexity of the Book of Mormon.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P7gi3kmz-pk

To Physics Guy - Your point about whether Joseph Smith was under 24-hour surveillance for 10 years does not explain how he dictated 531 pages to his scribes without any notes, papers, manuscripts or reference materials. Even if he had been secretly composing the Book of Mormon over 10 years, he was a 24-year-old farmer with the equivalent of a third-grade education who (as his own wife said) couldn't compose a coherent sentence. When would he have had time to farm and also secretly sneak out to do 10 years of research (even though much of the needed information wasn't even known in 1829)? Or if Spaulding had somehow composed the book, and Joseph was just a middleman, did Joseph memorize the 531 pages so he could dictate it to the scribes? Oh, so you think he memorized just the pages he would dictate that day? And how is it that when they stopped for dinner and return to the dictation, that he could pick up exactly where he left off, without needing his scribe to read back the last sentence he dictated, as his wife (who was a scribe for time) stated? You imply that all the eyewitnesses to the translation process, and to his daily life, including his own wife, parents and siblings were ALL liars. Wow, that's quite a theory. And as you yourself asked, what would have been their motivation? Because they WANTED to be persecuted, beaten, have their homes burned down, and be driven from state to state by angry mobs? Why didn't any of them ever "crack" and confess their complicity, even decades later?

[Physics Guy]

To Physics Guy - Your point about whether Joseph Smith was under 24-hour surveillance for 10 years does not explain how he dictated 531 pages to his scribes without any notes, papers, manuscripts or reference materials.

My point about the incomplete surveillance covers access to notes and references, too. What would it actually have taken for Smith to have compiled some notes and consulted them every day or two during his dictating phase? Maybe getting up quietly at night, say? Or working hard to stage a couple of impressive feats of memory to convince a couple of people that he needed no notes, but then actually using notes most of the time? The fact that a couple of friends and family stated later that Smith didn't use notes is hardly proof that he didn't use any. Those statements certainly don't make it so impossible for Smith to have had any notes or references that we are forced to consider supernatural sources.

Even if he had been secretly composing the Book of Mormon over 10 years, he was a 24-year-old farmer with the equivalent of a third-grade education who (as his own wife said) couldn't compose a coherent sentence.

I believe that Emma said Joseph couldn't write a letter, in a statement that might well just have meant that he had ugly handwriting. If she really said he couldn't compose a coherent sentence then this was a statement so obviously false that it must undermine her credibility in anything else she said. Joseph Smith wrote plenty of things in his own voice, and they generally read well. He was also a popular preacher.

When would he have had time to farm and also secretly sneak out to do 10 years of research (even though much of the needed information wasn't even known in 1829)?

The idea that the Book of Mormon required immense erudition to compose is a myth invented by Mormon apologists. In fact the Book is totally the kind of thing that an intelligent person whose education was mainly just the hearsay of Smith's place and time could have made up and spoken. It reads exactly like that. Any statements to the contrary are just Mormon apologists reading more into the text than is actually there, and building card castles of flimsy argument.

Or if Spaulding had somehow composed the book, and Joseph was just a middleman, did Joseph memorize the 531 pages so he could dictate it to the scribes? Oh, so you think he memorized just the pages he would dictate that day?

In fact my guess is that Smith made the story up by himself, perhaps with inspiration and information picked up from others but with no help in composing the text. But if you will, how hard would it really be to memorise that many pages? He wouldn't have to repeat them perfectly, after all, because if he goofed a few lines, nobody but he and his hypothetical collaborator would have been able to tell, anyway. Some people do have remarkable memories. The gift is rare, but far more common than prophethood, even on the Mormon account, which only acknowledges a handful of genuine prophets in all human history. If it would be too hard to believe that Smith was a one-in-a-million mnemonist, how can it be easier to believe instead that he was a one-in-a-billion prophet?

And how is it that when they stopped for dinner and return to the dictation, that he could pick up exactly where he left off, without needing his scribe to read back the last sentence he dictated, as his wife (who was a scribe for time) stated?

Are you saying that this is hard to do?

You imply that all the eyewitnesses to the translation process, and to his daily life, including his own wife, parents and siblings were ALL liars. Wow, that's quite a theory. And as you yourself asked, what would have been their motivation? Because they WANTED to be persecuted, beaten, have their homes burned down, and be driven from state to state by angry mobs? Why didn't any of them ever "crack" and confess their complicity, even decades later?

It is not my theory that the Smith family lied. I have no single particular theory. I do figure, though, that it might have been enough to account for the Book of Mormon, for all of Smith's family to have lied for him. Maybe it would have taken more than that. Or maybe not all of the family would need to have lied deliberately; maybe some could just have been deceived or otherwise mistaken. But it is one plausible answer to my question about what it would have taken to produce false statements by family members: the whole family could have lied. That might have done it, yes. It's one possibility.

Just how hard is that to believe, a family lying to support one of their own? It seems to me something that does often happen. Some families will even stay loyal like that through a lot of thick and thin. And in this case, "cracking" may not have been a tempting alternative, anyway, even if some family weakened. How much would it really have helped any Smith family member to have denounced Joseph as a fraud?

Even a pretty unusual degree of family loyalty would hardly be such an impossible thing that the angel Moroni becomes a more likely alternative.

[canpakes]

Even if (Smith) had been secretly composing the Book of Mormon over 10 years, he was a 24-year-old farmer with the equivalent of a third-grade education who (as his own wife said) couldn't compose a coherent sentence.

mhansen, I’m not sure that even the ardent LDS author and apologist Brian Hales would make that statement. Check out his article below in which a much more nuanced and complex ‘education’ of Smith is acknowledged:

https://journal.interpreterfoundation.o ... y-sources/

[bill4long]

To Physics Guy - Your point about whether Joseph Smith was under 24-hour surveillance for 10 years does not explain how he dictated 531 pages to his scribes without any notes, papers, manuscripts or reference materials.

He dictated 1/2 page a day until Cowdery got involved, then it was 8 to 9 pages a day, with breaks in the sessions.

Even if he had been secretly composing the Book of Mormon over 10 years, he was a 24-year-old farmer with the equivalent of a third-grade education who (as his own wife said) couldn't compose a coherent sentence.

The documentary evidence contradicts her claim.

Here are examples of Joe's writing and handwriting in 1832.

https://www.josephsmithpapers.org/site/ ... andwriting

Morever, it's certainly plausible that Joe was not the only one involved in the creation of the Book of Mormon. Hyrum and Cowdery were plausible accomplices.

When would he have had time to farm and also secretly sneak out to do 10 years of research (even though much of the needed information wasn't even known in 1829)?

What needed information wasn't known?

Oh, so you think he memorized just the pages he would dictate that day?

Why not? Also, considering that when Joe was involved with the Methodists, he would have likely encountered sermon and Bible memorization techniques that they were employing in the 1820s. For example, youth groups would memorize the entire Book of Matthew.

he could pick up exactly where he left off, without needing his scribe to read back the last sentence he dictated, as his wife (who was a scribe for time) stated?

See Early Mormon Documents, Vol. 4 by Dan Vogel, several accounts describe young Joseph's ability to recall and recite lengthy narratives,
keep track of complex storylines, and remember specific details over long periods.

You imply that all the eyewitnesses to the translation process, and to his daily life, including his own wife, parents and siblings were ALL liars.

You seem to be stuck in black and white thinking. The story is not that simple.

Wow, that's quite a theory.

Therefore an angel story is true?

And as you yourself asked, what would have been their motivation? Because they WANTED to be persecuted, beaten, have their homes burned down, and be driven from state to state by angry mobs? Why didn't any of them ever "crack" and confess their complicity, even decades later?

You're drifting here. But evidently you don't know much about Mormon history. The Mormons were far from innocent victims.

I'm curious, do you adhere to a "tight translation" or a "loose translation" theory?

Consider Ether 9:19. "And they also had horses, and asses, and there were elephants and cureloms and cumoms; all of which were useful unto man, and more especially the elephants and cureloms and cumoms." Have you thought about what a tight or loose translation entails for this verse?

This might be of interest: https://www.ldsdiscussions.com/tight-loose

How about the mention of elephants, cattle, sheep, goat, pigs, honey bees, silk, wheat? Where did they go? What about KJV Bible translation errors that made it into the Book of Mormon? How do you explain those? Not to mention, Deutero Isaiah, the long ending of Mark, etc.

I find the quotation of Isaiah 53 particularly interesting. viewtopic.php?f=3&t=159014