The Sacred Curse

[_Themis]

mfbukowski
Every alleged anachronism disappears if Joseph was teaching spiritual principles and not science or history.
When will we get over this nonsense??

I noticed he did not use the word just. If he would have I would have agreed that just teaching spiritual principles makes all the anachronisms disappear. Problem is Joseph was very much making some historical claims. His claims are so specific they are attached to his historical claims and having God's authority that no one else had. Joseph claimed to have real plates about a real people. He told many stories of those peoples over the years. mfbukowski would have been chastised by Joseph smith had he expressed those opinions to Joseph back then. The church is already losing a lot of BIC members. Drop the historical claims and see most of the rest go out the front door.

[_DrW]

Is mfbukowski and outlier with this PoV?

Yes he has some very different ideas about reality which you will have trouble finding a few in the church that think the same way.

Thanks for responding to my question. Your perception on the issue is much the same as my wife's, who still attends for a sense of community and to give service, but no longer believes in the nonsense. We live in the mission field and still enjoy visiting Utah now and then.

It seems to us that attitudes toward the Church among active and inactive members we know in Utah reflects less and less each year the image of the LDS Church that the leadership tries to portray to the public. Many of our family members in Utah have stopped attending altogether and instead participate in "fellowship" groups to maintain a sense of religious community.

That said, it will be interesting to see what the response from other internet Mormons turns out to be to mfbukowski's expressed view of Book of Mormon historicity. I agree with you that the sentiments mfbukowski expresses would have earned a quick excommunication had they been revealed to Joseph Smith Jr.

[_Dr Exiled]

I used to engage Mr. Bukowski prior to being kicked off of MDD by, I believe, Scott Lloyd, for bugging him about always responding to anything with follow the brethren, follow the brethren. Anyway, I think Mr. Bukowski is viewed much the same way one would view the old high priest in the ward that had his pet theories about whatever. However, if one digs down on what Bukowski claims, pretty much anything is true for a person, as long as that person believes it. He acknowledges the history problems and says so what, I believe anyway, and cites Alma 32 and D&C 93.

I agree that if the church ever espoused Mr. Bukowski's thinking, many would leave, that is if they were paying attention.

[_Analytics]

Sounds like a great book. I look forward to reading it.

[_Dr Exiled]

I'm about 3/4 the way through it and it occurred to me that if the Nephites came in and took over, one would expect to easily find their dna, not the other way around. Isn't the royal dna more likely to be preserved?

It seems so obvious, now more than ever, that the fictional model is the future. Many will leave once it sinks in, but the brethren will counter with where President Nelson already is when he was discussing geography and said that the more important question was the supposed spirituality one finds in the book. I personally believe that this spirituality wouldn't be there without the group pressure pointing to believe the mundane is somehow amazing.

[_candygal]

I don't suppose we could get Simon to dicker a little with Smac on the Mad board?? I would so love this!

[_aussieguy55]

Yes Simon go over there and rumble. Instead of them talking about you they have to talk to you.

[_Stem]

Smac just keeps saying the "science is inconclusive on the question" or something of the sort. The question in my mind is considering all the scientific findings is there anything to support the notion of the Lamanite story? He just keeps trying to turn it around on Simon. Well, no, if the science doesn't support the existence of something then there's no reason to conclude it exists. He'll just come back with, "well the science is inconclusive, we don't really know if there were Lamanites or not. I know cause I've read the apologetic responses".

Even if the case can be made its possible they were around at some point, it still doesn't give any reason to think they were around.

[_Brackite]

Here is the link to the other Mormon discussion board about Simon's new book .
http://www.mormondialogue.org/topic/725 ... -new-book/

[_Lemmie]

From Brackite’s link, the first post:

Smac:

First, this sounds like Southerton is talking about generalized teachings about the text of the Book of Mormon, rather than the text itself. Latter-day Saint apologists are, in the main, not fixated on so-called "Lamanite DNA."

Critics (most notably Southerton and Murphy) have, I think, hung their hats almost exclusively on extra-textual arguments about the Book of Mormon (i.e. the Introduction's reference to "principal ancestors," culled comments from LDS leaders, etc.) and have largely ignored the actual text of the book itself.

They have also tried to posit DNA as the definitive falsifying factor of the Book of Mormon when the subject is obviously much more complex than that (adoptive lineage, heritage-as-lineage, plus the arguments set forth in the FARMS Review and elsewhere (see below) that DNA can neither prove nor disprove the Book of Mormon).

[spacing added for ease of reading]


Wow. Revisionist history is just stunning. Is this how they teach it now?

Every time science disproves an element of the Mormon church, someone decides:

1. That’s not really what we believe.

2. That’s not what you learned growing up, and if it is, you learned it wrong.

and/or

3. Words don’t mean what we used to think they meant, if that meaning is disproven by science.

The havoc that arguments like that must wreak in an intelligent mind is beyond understanding.