Hello Beastie,
Sorry. Just finished watching the PBS special.
This is not about my argument, it is about your argument, and how you perceive it offers support for your overall theory about the Book of Mormon.
You believe there were actual plates with real words on them,
I do.
and you believe that the fact that "parash", in "reformed egyptian", could have meant both horse and horsemen.
As I’ve illustrated, the Hebrew word
parash means both horse and horseman. I believe that reformed Egyptian describes the script used by the Nephites to write their native Hebrew tongue. Therefore, the term
parash, which means both horse and horseman, might have appeared on the plates.
Now, if this were so, and Joseph Smith had studied reformed egyptian and had learned the word "parash" means "horse" but didn't learn, or forgot or overlooked, that it can also mean "horsemen", then your argument makes sense.
Yes. That scenario would make sense.
Your argument does not make sense if Joseph Smith did not know "reformed egyptian", and thereby could not make the connection between "parash" and "horse" in the first place.
I’m not convinced that this scenario leads to your conclusion, but irregardless, no one can prove that Joseph did not learn some of the language on the plates and in fact, if there
were real plates with a
real language that Joseph was working with, I would assume that it would be highly unlikely that the Prophet would not have learned some aspects of the grammar and script.
Obviously, there was a divine intervention in this process,
I agree. But
intervention does not mean that God had a tight
control over the process, that the work did not come through the filter of a 19th century American prophet of God. I believe that it did.
however you imagine it, and God was the who provided the meaning of the word.
Yes, but I don’t claim to know
how God provided the meaning of the word. Joseph specifically states that it was not for the world to know how God did it, and Joseph was the only one with a first hand knowledge of the process (though I strongly suspect that he himself did not even fully understand the mechanisms).
I believe that as instructed, Joseph studied the information contained on the plates in his own mind and with the direct assistance of revelation, produced an inspired, albeit, non-perfect production. No doubt part of the work also involved seeing words appear in his hat via the seer stone, and some of the work derived from taking portions of the King James Version of Isaiah and placing them, as directed by the Spirit of the Lord, directly into the book.
God's intervening and resulting in this simple error doesn't make sense under either the tight OR loose translation theory, or your combination of the two (an ad hoc theory too convenient by half)
It doesn’t make sense
if you assume that God fed Joseph the Book of Mormon word by word. I don’t know anyone who believes in such a process. I certainly don’t.