Mormon Infobia...

[_Benjamin McGuire]

Drifting writes:

So the entire Book of Mormon was produced without the use of the Urim & Thummim but with Joseph's face in a hat reading words off a rock.

But this isn't an accurate statement Drifting either.

Show me where the Church teaches or depicts visually that method.

And I am asking why this is so important. I think it is a relevant question. In fact, I want to know why it is of such import that we have visual depictions (I assume, of course, that you want to insist on the visual aspect because we do have other versions that aren't visual that do discuss this method). So what makes this such a sensitive issue for just the visual depictions.

The fact that you can't proves the point that the Church is fearing this becoming common knowledge. Worse, the Church forwards a gross deception by not articulating it this way when teaching about the translation.

This is a completely nonsensical argument. If the church feared that this would become common knowledge, then it wouldn't have such a clear description published in the Ensign by an apostle. More than that, I really question on a fundamental level what it is that you think the church is afraid of? Do you think the church is afraid of introducing some sort of supernatural element into the equation? If that were true, then why all the pictures of angels? Why does the church over-emphasize the fact that Joseph couldn't translate on his own for beans - that he could only produce the Book of Mormon with divine assistance? At what point, as I noted, did the face in the hat somehow become a bigger element in the narrative than the angel? I think that the obsession over this isn't based on any coherent narrative.

Good to know, i'll let the Missionaries know.

You do that. But most of them are already told this. They don't convert people by explaining its history - they convert people who read it and receive a witness from the Holy Ghost.

But not one with Joseph's face in a hat.....

That's right. But then, and I think this is rather a part of this discussion - such a depiction would be problematic - because, after all, it wouldn't be as useful in attempting to depict what was going on. You see this event in what seems to be such a single dimension that you completely ignore everything else. And yet, it is one of the most insignificant parts of the events being described. I think that the perspective you present is badly flawed.

So if its irrelevant why does the Church teach and depict an incorrect method?

It isn't. And you haven't justified this. This is a depiction of an event. What is the event being depicted? The translation of the Gold Plates through the power of God. There are, of course, other things missing (depending on the description you want to use). We don't see the curtain. We do see the plates (which generally weren't even in the same room when the seer stone was being used). But, such a depiction of Joseph with his face in a hat offers so little context as to make it practically useless for the purposes that I assume that the church uses the art that they do use. At the same time, we come back to your emphasis on the art. And if there was only art you might have a point - but, there isn't. The church certainly has never tried to suggest that this translation was done in any normative sense, with lexicons and grammars ....

No I can't.

It seemed an easy enough question. Why can't you answer it?

So why does the Church persist in perpetrating this deception?

Perhaps you would be much more clear about what you mean when you say "deception". Deception involves involves an intention to convince someone that you believe something that you do not. What is it that the church is trying to teach that is deceptive?

Ben M.

[_Benjamin McGuire]

Steelhead writes:

I'll ask you the same question I asked sub..... How many, and what are the references to the doctrine and historical practice of polygamy in the recent Joseph Smith and Brigham Young "Teachings of" manuals?

I have no idea. I think we run into an entirely different problem here. The church has to balance two issues - the fact that there was a past practice, and the fact that such a practice is no longer tolerated. Beyond the fact that it isn't tolerated anymore, I am not sure I see a need for discussion in lesson manuals designed for use in our Sunday worship and classes.

Ben M.

[_Drifting]

Ben,

In the student manual for the Book of Mormon Institute course it talks about the translation method. It even quotes specifically from Russell Nelson's piece in the Ensign, the one reference on LSD.org to the rock in the hat.

Guess which bit of the piece is missing from the quote?

(I would link it but it's PDF and it won't let me. But you can find it easily enough I'm sure).

This is an example of the Church deliberately omitting historically accurate information. We can speculate why. I cannot think of a more reasonable explanation than the Church doesn't want institute students to read about that method.

[Guest]

Seeing as how polygamy was a major issue of the time and doctrine, revelations and proclamations in regard to polygamy constitute the major portion of BY's teaching, you do not think it strange that a manual of his teachings only has one reference to polygamy, and that just to mention that he practiced it? Polygamy is still doctrinal, just not currently practiced.

[_Benjamin McGuire]

Fence Sitter writes:

It only seems to be irrelevant to those that believe in the divine origins of the Book of Mormon and are aware of the face-in-the-hat method. To anyone else who encounters this description it is very relevant. If it were as irrelevant as you say, to those that believe, one would expect to see it portrayed that way at least some of the time. Instead we encounter a myriad of excuses (Kierkegaard indeed!) for why it is not. The more excuses there are the more it is evident that it is indeed relevant and viewed as embarrassing.

I actually disagree with you Fence Sitter. Most non-believers actually never make it past the angel.

It seems to me that it is primarily of interest to those who think it ought to be embarrassing to the church and thus who consequently want to make it embarrassing to the church. There are some flaws with your thinking. The biggest of them is the simple fact that it has NEVER been presented in that fashion. That is, the whole face in the hat story vanishes long before it would seem to be an issue over which it might have been an embarrassment. More confusion (at least in this regard) was generated by the fact that seer stones in general were often called "Urim and Thumim". So in reading the historical record, it can sometimes be difficult to separate a reference to the interpreters buried with the plates from a reference to the brown stone Joseph used to translate much of the Gold Plates. There was a mention made in a periodical in the late 19th century, but for the most part, it simply isn't discussed. So we don't have some kind of policy change or shift on the part of the church to hide or cover up this "embarrassment". And then, of course, we have published by the church the detailed descriptions that mention the face in the hat. Artists don't usually become historians when trying to depict something. This isn't hiding. This is simply not making much of an effort to clear up an old misunderstanding that has developed.

The point about Kierkegaard is simply this - you are making a mountain out of a mole hill. The purpose of the church is not to first and foremost provide some kind of historical narrative - it is to teach the gospel. Talking about the Book of Mormon (how it was translated, the history of the text, even how archaeology supports or refutes it) takes by far a second seat to reading the Book of Mormon as a religious and theological text. Churches don't as a general rule focus on talking in this way about their bibles. We don't see sermons generally about how the Bible came to be, what role the Masoretes might have played, hoe significant Tyndale was, or why we had a mistake in the commandments in a 1631 edition of the KJV which subsequently caused it to be labeled the Wicked Bible. Only in absolute isolation is this even remotely an issue. The church is not attempting to hide the fact that we believe that there was a great deal of supernatural involvement in the translation of the Book of Mormon. And yet here we have this parsing right down to dealing only with the artwork ... I don't buy the argument.

We have the repeated assertion that the fact that the church has artwork that does not show Joseph's face buried in a hat is proof absolute that the church is afraid of presenting the truth (despite an apostle's article in the Ensign which provides just that assessment). You haven't convinced me. I think far more could be said about the polygamy issues, where there has been a historical shift, where details have been omitted intentionally, and where we can question the validity of potential motivations to do so. This (the face in the hat) is not the same situation at all.

Ben M.

[_Benjamin McGuire]

Seeing as how polygamy was a major issue of the time and doctrine, revelations and proclamations in regard to polygamy constitute the major portion of BY's teaching, you do not think it strange that a manual his teachings only has one reference to polygamy, and that just to mention that he practiced it? Polygamy is still doctrinal, just not current practice.

I think that the decision to excise some of that material was over reaching. However, I don't think it strange at all to exclude teachings on polygamy, when, whether it is doctrinal or not, it is no longer practiced and is actively condemned. I think this is particularly true in light of the ways in which (at least in recent years) the issue of polygamy has resurfaced. But, as I said, I don't agree with the extent to which it was removed.

Ben M.

[_Buffalo]

Drifting writes:

So the entire Book of Mormon was produced without the use of the Urim & Thummim but with Joseph's face in a hat reading words off a rock.

But this isn't an accurate statement Drifting either.

My understanding is that only the lost manuscript was produced with the Urim & Thummim. The extant Book of Mormon we have today was produced using the seer stone only. Correct?

[_SteelHead]

Academically, I would say that teaching BY without teaching polygamy is akin to teaching Einstein without teaching or mentioning relativity.

[Guest]

Academically, I would say that teaching BY without teaching polygamy is akin to teaching Einstein without teaching or mentioning relativity.

Why doesn't Adam/God gets a mention nor loathsome Negro's being slaves.
I guess a more accurate title for the manual would be:

The Teachings of Brigham Young That We Still Agree With

Edited to correct my abuse of the English language.

[_Benjamin McGuire]

Drifting writes:

In the student manual for the Book of Mormon Institute course it talks about the translation method. It even quotes specifically from Russell Nelson's piece in the Ensign, the one reference on LSD.org to the rock in the hat.

Guess which bit of the piece is missing from the quote?

Actually, most of Nelson's article is missing (about 90 percent of it is excluded). The picture that accompanied Nelson's article did not have the hat (it did have the curtain). However, you haven't actually answered my question. How does the manual grossly misrepresent what happened?

In particular, it deals with Emma's testimony. But, Emma served primarily as a scribe for the 116 pages that were later lost. It was during this part of the process that Joseph used the interpreters he acquired with the plates, and did not use the face in a hat method. So ... again, which part of the manual did you think was a gross misrepresentation? And do you think that the manual was attempting to describe the process of translation in a way that would require us to have an understanding of what others saw Joseph doing?

Ben M.