The Interpreter Radio Show

[_Philo Sofee]

I dunno Scratch. When Peterson gets the bit in his mouth he can move mountains if needed. What this will do is utterly annihilate any authenticity or good scholarly acumen they are hoping and even imagining they have, once word gets out to the real historians what the film says and doesn't include and say or what they fail to analyze and why they ignore some things, or include others. It could be one of the best missionary tools for leaving Mormonism ever created,especially ironic since the dream is imagining flocks will gather to the waters of Mormon to be baptized. I will be truly interested in seeing what you, Jersey Girl, Vogel, Marquardt, Grindael, Shulem, and Analytics, Moksha, Kishkumen, Gadianton, Symmachus, Dr4Cam, Honorentheos, and many others, Lemmie, Kevin Graham, UnckeDale, and others analyze with what is presented. Hell I am actually going to pray to Elohim that he helps get it produced. I am quite serious. If it ends up needing money, we all need to step up and help fund it so they can put this out there since they claim it will be the most thorough and objective, lets make sure it gets looked at and see what they interpret as thorough and objective right?

[_moksha]

DCP and the apologists are contemptuous of the "Sister in Parowan," ...

Quien es la "Hermana en Parowan"?

[_Kishkumen]

1:08:20: Peterson:

[Elder Pearson] realizes, the church realizes now that if the church comes out with a film on the Witnesses, it's going to be dismissed, upfront, as propaganda, one-sided propaganda, and it almost should be. It's not the church's mission to air criticisms and so on--that's not what it's about. We are actively going out of our way to interview non-Latter-day Saint historians to get their perspectives on the Witnesses, their experiences with the angel and the plates and so on. We want to hear those voices. Now I will not conceal the fact that I come down very strongly on the side of there having been an angel and real plates . . . . And I think the evidence will show that, at least point strongly in that direction. But in order to gain credibility, we want to go after the strongest counterarguments that we can find--not from the nut cake, fringe anti-Mormons who don't have academic credibility and they're not serious, but from people who've really given it serious hard thought but are not believers. What do they have to say? And we'll address those. I've let it be known that in doing this film, we want to address every single serious objection or concern or criticism or reservation that's been expressed about the Witnesses.

"The strongest counter-arguments we can find."

B.S.

What they want is Taves. Someone who has essentially ported in a compatible theology and dressed it up as "Religious Studies." Transubstantiation of the Gold Plates. Then DCP et al. can say, "Well, we don't exactly agree, but you can see that Religious Studies scholars do take this seriously as a real experience."

Well, you don't need to Catholicize the plates to accept that the witnesses had religious experiences. BFD!

The real questions reside in what the religious experiences of the witnesses actually mean. And the truth of the matter is that they could mean ANYTHING. What they mean to the witnesses is entirely conditioned by their context. I say that not to invalidate their experience by any means. I say that to argue the limitations involved in using their witnesses to forward arguments that their experiences have no bearing on.

Like, "Because these are credible witnesses who had actual visions of an angel and felt the plates, we know the Book of Mormon is an ancient record."

Sure, if by that you mean, "These experiences established their belief in an alternate history that isn't shared by anyone who does not believe in the book and is as of yet unsupported by a preponderance of evidence or shared by any non-Restorationist scholar," then fine. Yes, the witnesses were sincere in their experiences and came to believe genuinely in the divine origins of the Book of Mormon.

And so what?

This does not compel anyone else to believe, nor persuade any serious person to investigate the phony history of the Book of Mormon seriously in academic terms. So, really, we always stay at square one. You either believe because you want to believe or have had an experience that makes you believe, or you do not believe. If LDS people need to watch Ann Taves talk about the Transubstantiation of the plates in order to feel validated, then I suppose this film will have been well worth the time, money, and effort.

But in real terms, this film accomplishes nothing of scholarly value at all.

[_Gadianton]

B.S.

What they want is Taves. Someone who has essentially ported in a compatible theology and dressed it up as "Religious Studies." Transubstantiation of the Gold Plates. Then DCP et al. can say, "Well, we don't exactly agree, but you can see that Religious Studies scholars do take this seriously as a real experience."

This is a notable suggestion, but if they go this route, then how will they differentiate themselves from the new MI, who let's face it, can do religious studies better than they can, has the inroads, and already the implicit backing of the Church?

But sure, if the best "counter-arguments" come from the only credentialed folks who would dare accept the challenge for political reasons, and they challenge along the lines of, for instance, "we don't know if the Gold Plates qualify to be transubstantiated" -- a total underhanded softball, then they have a shot at answering the challenge.

[_Kishkumen]

This is a notable suggestion, but if they go this route, then how will they differentiate themselves from the new MI, who let's face it, can do religious studies better than they can, has the inroads, and already the implicit backing of the Church?

But sure, if the best "counter-arguments" come from the only credentialed folks who would dare accept the challenge for political reasons, and they challenge along the lines of, for instance, "we don't know if the Gold Plates qualify to be transubstantiated" -- a total underhanded softball, then they have a shot at answering the challenge.

Excellent point, Dean Robbers. I would amend my suggestion to leave out the "Religious Studies" term and leave it as "non-LDS scholars." Still, I think the overall gist is the same. Find a non-LDS scholar to say something that impresses upon LDS minds that other people take their foundations seriously, and the job is done. Of course, we can accept the fact that non-believers gonna non-believe. "Wow, if only they would! They are so close. How can they not believe in ancient Nephites if they've come this far already?!?!?!?"

[_Tom]

I received some fluids this morning and managed some further transcription.

1:09:46: Peterson:

I want to deal with those things. We'll confront them head on. And why did the Witnesses leave the church? We're not just going to say because they were proud and wicked. No, Oliver Cowdery left the church partly over early plural marriage.

Wait, what? Cowdery left the church partly over early plural marriage? I've looked through multiple manuals posted on lds.org (Gospel Doctrine, institute, and seminary), and I find nothing to support this fringe assertion.

Peterson:

And we're going to talk about that--not at great length, but honesty, candidly, upfront. And the fact that he maintained his testimony of the Book of Mormon even after that, and ultimately returned to the church, is deeply impressive. . . . Whatever his issues with Joseph Smith or the early policies of the church or, you know, in Martin Harris' case, there were financial issues--the Kirtland Safety Society and things like that--they had reasons to be unhappy and, you know, frankly, few of us today have to put up with that kind of stress and strain. So, we're going to try to take a humanly, understanding, empathetic approach to them. But they would have insisted, just as we will, that their testimonies stand. . . .

[The film]'s going to take a while. It's partly dependent on funding. We've tried to do the interviews in a nice location that doesn't look institutional, you know, so we've had some kind people allow us to use their very nice homes, for example, to sit the scholars down and set up the equipment. . . . Well, one person asked, "Well, how long is this going to take?" The producer of the--well, I guess I am the producer; he's the...I don't remember what he is. I'm the executive producer--I've forgotten the titles. I'm the grand poobah and he's something else, the chief enchilada or something. [Wyatt chuckles] But anyhow, he said, "Well, you know, probably around 2020 or thereabouts." And she said, "Oh no, no, that's, that's too slow. We need to speed that up. People need this." She had listened to all the interviews and really liked them. That day we interviewed Susan Easton Black and Terryl Givens, and they were good interviews. She said, "No, no, it has to happen faster." Well, it has to--it takes money. I mean, at a certain point, we want to film on location in Palmyra and Missouri and so on. The best time to do it is probably in the spring, when the leaves are green and it's pretty comfortable. . . . or in the fall, we might do that. But we'll need to have money for that or then we'll have to wait for the next season. We're not going back to Palmyra to film in the winter. So if anybody out there has a spare $100,000 or something--or less, frankly--gosh, we'd appreciate it. This, I think, is going to be an important film. . . . I'm actively pursuing funding for Interpreter in general and for this film in particular.

Dr. Peterson says: "We are actively going out of our way to interview non-Latter-day Saint historians to get their perspectives on the Witnesses, their experiences with the angel and the plates and so on." From what I can tell, he's interviewed the following:

Richard Lloyd Anderson
Karl Ricks Anderson
Susan Easton Black
Richard Bushman
Terryl Givens
John Turner

[_Philo Sofee]

Oliver Cowdery left Mormonism because Joseph Smith had an affair with Fanny Alger. It has nothing to do with polygamy, and absolutely everything with adultery with a minor. Or at least a very young woman. Emma told Oliver about catching Joseph and Oliver confronted Joseph. THAT is why Cowdery left. This is how I understand it. Peterson is already soft peddling! No surprise. It would have been tough enough if Joseph had just confessed to adultery AND repented and quit, but nooooooo, he then kept at it for the rest of his pea pickin life finding as many women as he could intimidate, coerce or convince to be his lover. And he got others involved with him in the most atrocious scenarios of secrecy one can imagine. NO, this is entirely U-G-L-Y.

[_Kishkumen]

This is an interesting if ultimately pointless comparison to make: "If we had lived then, would we have abandoned the Prophet?" So, yes, Cowdery leaves because his partner in the conspiracy is diddling teenage girls under his nose. But he comes back because he had so much invested in the Book of Mormon conspiracy in the first place. It's the most promising achievement of his life. What else is he going to do? At least this is interesting, and who knows where it will go?

Well, this is where the comparison falls flat. We know where it went, and very few of us have as big a stake in this as old Oliver Cowdery had. So when we find out about Joseph's habit of sleeping with the free help around the house, we say, "well, let's see, I pay ten percent of my earnings, go to boring ass meetings, listen to leaders who aren't very impressive, and I can't drink beer or coffee." The calculation of investment versus return is pretty easy to make. Why not reject the wild claims of the guy who was a serial adulterer with young kids, and save yourself time, money, pointless abstinence, and boredom?

[_Tom]

There are some gems in there, Tom.

The last quote about looking for "real historian" feedback on the witnesses and plates and angels is interesting. Isn't that kind of like looking for "real mammalogist" feedback on the Loch Ness Monster or Big Foot?

I wonder what their expectations are? He says they want the strongest counterarguments. I wonder how much time "real historians" are going to spend thinking about it?

Not much, I’m afraid. Thus far, they’ve interviewed a single non-LDS historian. Given the film’s limited budget, I would suggest pursuing interviews with scholars who can wear two hats and have something new to say about plates and angels. We’ve heard from Bushman, Anderson, Givens, and the like so many times. How about hearing Warren Aston situate the testimonies of the three Book of Mormon witnesses in the wider ufological milieu (alien visitation accounts) of frontier New England ca. 1830? Or Jeff Meldrum could draw illuminating comparisons between 19th century Big Foot sightings and the earliest descriptions of Moroni by Mormons focusing on Moroni’s extreme height, strength, hairiness, and grunting (the last is understandable given the exertion needed to lug around tumbaga plates weighing 50 pounds).

[_Philo Sofee]

Already the claim of Peterson is entirely lop sided, with only one non-Mormon scholar (who won't join the church I am willing to bet, so its all about niceties, not convincing evidence enough to make him say gosh yeah! This IS the truth after all!) All else is just the same Mormon historians/apologists... why doesn't that surprise anyone these days? Where the rubber meets the road it's not even a screech of the tires, they are flat and can't function. There is no traction here in the least.

This is Peterson apparently trying like crazy to get back into the high graces of the Brethren instead of being just another mere Mormon guy they are gonna have to pay retirement to from the BYU retirement fund. Perhaps if he gets enough volume he might be able to at least make a 70 in, oh say, another decade after he and his wife at least serve a mission somewhere?