The Book of Mormon: Man-Made or God-Given?

[_honorentheos]

Do you realize what you just asked?

You just asked me to prove to you something that isn't attested to in the actual non-BoM record.

Go back and read your links. They comment time and again at how amazing the knowledge is that Zenos and his people demonstrate that others of the time might not have. Why? Maybe it's because others of the time outside of China didn't have the knowledge. They're assuming the Book of Zeno is real and then composing an argument. The tech did not exist at the time in a place that would have made its way into the Brass Plates. Have fun finding a non-LDS source that will back you up.

You haven't demonstrated anything more than that this is an anachronism still.

Again, the Book of Mormon asserts that the technique was known. If it is your contention that it wasn’t, the burden is on you to prove your case, not on us to disprove it.

That thought was percolating around in the back of my foggy mind last night too, zerinus.

Regards,
MG

The Book of Mormon is a 19th century text.

The talmud, OTOH, would at least date to the period covered by the Book of Mormon. So -

In several Talmudic parables, marriage is compared to grafting; thus we find that marriage of a scholar into a noble family is to be praised, comparable to a graft between high-quality grape cultivars; whereas marriage of a scholar into a family of illiterates is as unacceptable as a graft between quality grapes and wild grapes (Talmud Bavli Pesachim 49a). However, according to Talmudic sources (Yerushalmi Kilayim 1:7), the verse ‘‘Your sons like olive seedlings surrounding your table’’ (Psalms 128:3) is interpreted ‘‘Just like olive trees, which are never grafted, so your offspring will be flawless.’’

Even when the burden didn't really fall on me I delivered with evidence it may not have been practiced at a particular time period that would have overlapped the ability of Lehi to have brought that described practice with him. So, balls in your court to prove that the practice of olive grafting existed pre-exile among the Israelites.

by the way, fencesitter made a pretty interesting point upthread about the Nephite audience and old world technologies.

[_mentalgymnast]

In short, Jacob 5 aligns very well with the practices of apple cultivation including grafting which Joseph Smith would have been familiar as his mother describes their family cultivating apples in her biographical works.

This is interesting stuff. Thanks for sharing. I've been doing a bit more reading.

Your thoughts on this:

However, such information did not generally form part of Joseph Smith’s frontier culture. Nor did he betray the ancient allegory by using more modern horticultural terms, such as budding, rootstock, mulching, cultivation, mutation, incompatibility, and so forth. As a final detail, even though pruning was certainly part of nineteenth-century American practices, Joseph Smith would have been familiar with it in relation to deciduous trees or vines, in which pruning has to consider the wood on which fruit would be borne the next year. Grapes and apples would be examples with which Joseph Smith would have been familiar. In contrast, the pruning of the olive, a subtropical evergreen fruit tree, is initially for training to make it into a tree rather than a bush, and second for rejuvenation—or, more appropriately, survival. In the nine times the word pruning is used in the parable, survival rather than increased fruit production, is implied. Survival pruning reverses the aging process by altering the balance of regulators (hormones). It is not the type of pruning Joseph Smith knew.


https://rsc.BYU.edu/archived/scriptures ... considered

Regards,
MG

[_honorentheos]

Is your argument he needs to be a well read genius whose knowledge came from books? or someone who learned by doing and had experience dunging up around trees? All while speaking in a Late War biblical manner? This is reverse Callister thinking.

I don't think it matters, MG. The central question is this: Is the Book of Mormon a product of the 19th century or of ancient origin? If your OP had approached the question with integrity that would have been the debate. And we've been down that road, too.

In this instance, the problem for the Book of Mormon is establishing that this parable came from an ancient source. It has problems with this as it can't be shown that a Zenos-like person would have been able to compose the parable in the time period purported because it may have been the case the pre-exilic Israelites didn't actually graft olive trees. It also hurts the narrative that, as Chap described rather clearly, the description of olive production and storage isn't reflective of what someone who was knowledgeable with olive production, their characteristics as a "fruit", or their processing, use and storage would have known. The language does match well with someone who is envisioning how they worked with apples.

So Joseph Smith talked about dunging up around trees rather than saying "mulching" or avoided saying "incompatibility". I'd challenge a person to point out an instance of Joseph Smith saying this period. Why? If he is the author and was familiar with apple grafting, the language found in the Book of Mormon would be his language not that of a professional horticulturalist.

I also think your source is wrong about Americans of the 19th century not knowing that removing growth to rebalance the root masses ability to improve a tree's health could increase it's chance of survival when it comes to fruiting stock. But perhaps you'd be interested in checking with non-LDS sources for some of your research?

[_mentalgymnast]

On the first page of the thread a poster said:

Well no, the argument in this thread has been whether the Book of Mormon is true or not. It's pretty clear that if it is not "true" then it doesn't matter who wrote it or how it came to be.

And I, right away, saw that I disagreed with THIS being the primary question. Others wanted to follow this line/starting point also. I don't see ANY lack of integrity by pointing out through my posts that I didn't agree with this original question and some others that were similar to it.

My contention was that provenance came/comes first. And I stated that as a matter of fact early on in the thread.

Later in your most recent post you said:

If your OP had approached the question with integrity that would have been the debate. And we've been down that road, too.

Down that road again. I disagree. But be that as it may...

What was the question that I should have approached with integrity? The above? One of the other questions proposed by others?

I didn't have 'a question' initially except to ask others to read Elder Callister's talk and give their input/opinion. All else evolved from that.

So again, maybe I missed something (very possible). What was this 'question' you're referring to?

The thing is, there was a bit of disagreement as to what the 'thread' direction was to be. It actually ended up going in a number of different directions and I don't know that there was ONE question that we were settling on. It became somewhat of a hodgepodge.

Which was OK by me.

Regards,
MG

[_mentalgymnast]

I don't think it matters, MG.

Now it doesn't matter? Did it before?

Regards,
MG

[_Jersey Girl]

I wasn't going to respond to this...but I will.

Of course you will. I could post the ingredients off a Campbell's soup label and you'd respond to it.

[_Lemmie]

I also think your source is wrong about Americans of the 19th century not knowing that removing growth to rebalance the root masses ability to improve a tree's health could increase it's chance of survival when it comes to fruiting stock. But perhaps you'd be interested in checking with non-LDS sources for some of your research?

It might also help if his research were a little more recent. Mentalgymnast's quote is from a 1984 article, and the references the article relies upon range from 1901 to 1966. Hugh Nibley is referenced as the first horticultural "source." Checking with non-lds sources is crucial if he's going to rely on such weak data sources.

ETA I see mentalgymnast is beginning his usual fictional re-write phase where he attempts to save face. Sad.

[_honorentheos]

In reference to Callister's talk, if he were honest about the primary issue that both critic and believer share regarding the providence of the Book of Mormon, it's this:

Either the Book of Mormon is a product of the 19th century or it is of ancient origin.

That allows for points and counterpoints to be presented without predetermining a winner. Callister, acting without integrity, simply states that unless a person can answer TO HIS SATISFACTION ONLY who wrote the Book of Mormon, then it must be assumed it was of God.

Since the evidence required for those like Callister, and apparently some participants in this thread ;) , is of such a standard than one isn't likely to ever be able to answer the subjective criteria to his subjective standard, it comes back to what I said to you first off in the thread. It was a pep rally piece.

Are you entertaining the idea that the conversation should be about evidence for or against it being a work of the 19th century or of ancient authorship?

[_honorentheos]

I also think your source is wrong about Americans of the 19th century not knowing that removing growth to rebalance the root masses ability to improve a tree's health could increase it's chance of survival when it comes to fruiting stock. But perhaps you'd be interested in checking with non-LDS sources for some of your research?

It might also help if his research were a little more recent. Mentalgymnast's quote is from a 1984 article, and the references the article relies upon range from 1901 to 1966. Hugh Nibley is referenced as the first horticultural "source." Checking with non-lds sources is crucial if he's going to rely on such weak data sources.

Good point, and I think MG should take it to heart as a well-intentioned suggestion.

[_honorentheos]

I don't think it matters, MG.

Now it doesn't matter? Did it before?

Regards,
MG

How many times do I have to say it for it to sink in that no, it doesn't matter. What matters is how well the information in the actual Book of Mormon itself corresponds to external realities. And as I've contended with you thread after thread, it compares very well with thoughts, beliefs, and practices common to the time of Joseph Smith while having serious conflict with evidence from the time periods it is claimed to cover.

I'm being consistent, MG. Not sure why that is hard to see.