Loan shifting the anachronisms away

[MG 2.0]

In your response to my post, yes.

Regards,
MG

In your response to my response, yes. And infinite plus 1. I know you are but what am I?

Great comeback, MG.

And true.

Regards,
MG

[Marcus]

DCP has written that the implications are too dangerous. If Joseph Smith was intentionally deceiving others into thinking it was historical, or if God was deceiving Joseph, then the whole church falls apart. His case in point is the Community of Christ.

Not only that, where would it leave the Witnesses? Cruise Lady? I suspect DCP is less concerned about the implications for the Church, and is more bothered about where such a shift would leave his own credibility. He’s heavily invested in its historicity.

Those movie residuals aren't going to generate themselves, that's a certainty.

[Dr. Shades]

As far as the rest goes, I am not generally a fan of critiquing an argument simply by pointing out what's wrong with it[.]

Man, you must have hated the old FARMS Review of Books.

[Benjamin McGuire]

I'm sure I'm missing something here, but can you explain what you mean by this? On the most superficial level, this is true. The Book of Mormon says horse, critics say "no horse" and the obvious response, if not the only possible response is to either say, "yah huh horse" or that horse means something else. I mean, yes, critics should prepare themselves for the reality that humans aren't going to sit back and be told that they are wrong, and the comeback probably isn't going to be earthshakingly honest in a case like this. What would you suggest would make a 'better' critic? Instead of looking for anachronisms, which will trigger the obvious, what should they be looking for?

You probably aren't missing something - I am just not always good at getting my thoughts out (especially in forums where I don't have the luxury of editing it slowly over a period of time).

What I mean is this - there is a history in the dialogue between critics and believers of the Book of Mormon that revolves around certain issues. Sometimes that dialogue has gotten to the point of being an insider's discussion. For me, the questions that need to be asked aren't the questions that are asked in that back and forth. The list linked to in the OP illustrates a bit of this - because that list is a response to criticism. And in responding to the criticism in the way that it does, it allows the pre/anti-critical views and their assumptions to dictate the discussion about the text. I'll give a couple of examples from that list:

Goats & Wild Goats (Confirmed as a loan shift). Though species of goats in the Americas appear to have gone extinct prior to Book of Mormon times, Early Spanish observers characterized certain species of Mesoamerican deer as “goats” and “wild goats”.

(Confirmed as a loan shift). The Book of Mormon use of the term “sow” has been interpreted by critics as a reference to swine, of which there is no evidence in pre-Columbian America. But New World peccaries closely resemble pigs, were often named as such by the Spanish, and were an important meat source in ancient Mesoamerica, suggesting a plausible loan shift.

In theory (and to beat a dead horse), if we had loan shifting going on (and I argued that, technically speaking, we don't), then the loan-shifting should tell us something both about the text and about the cultural milieu that produces the text. But because we are engaged in this back and forth, we get nothing that helps us understand the text. And if we really had loan shifting going on (or as I would argue a potential lexical expansion), then the fact that it occurs should tell us something about the text that would help us understand it. Instead, the argument here is about a way to keep a completely literal reading of the text that implies a historicity of sorts - it wants to take all of the problems of the text (in the believer's reading) and move them back to the gold plates (to equate the Book of Mormon text with the gold plates) and then provide a solution to the problem - and this approach, I think, makes it more difficult for people to actually read the text (it certainly works this way with other texts if we were to try and do this). And overall, this push back on to the gold plates results in long lists of problems with the text. The CES letter, for example, talks about the Book of Mormon's use of the King James text: "Why does the Book of Mormon, which is supposed to have been completed by Moroni over 1,400 years prior, contain the exact identical seven italicized words of 17th century translators?" It's a question that does all of the same things that I am critical here of the apologist: it wants to blend the modern Book of Mormon with the ancient gold plates, it wants to put any problematic area of the text back on to the gold plates (to be explained or criticized there). And so on. If we talk instead about the fact that the modern Book of Mormon using the King James text as part of its rhetorical ("translation") strategy, issues like this, issues like the goat and wild goat, issues like the word "sow" are clearly placed into the modern text - and we stop getting sidetracked by this back and forth. This won't make potential issues with the text disappear - but what it will do is to move most of the superficial ones off of the table so that we can have a much more interesting conversation about what the text is trying to do rather than what it is merely saying. This isn't really a complete description of what I mean, but it is a starting point.

We don't really have to know what a goat or a wild goat might mean in the sense of historicity to understand the text. The same can generally be said of the horse. This would be like reading about Marco Polo and substituting the word rhinoceros for unicorn - I think it actually makes the reading more difficult. We don't really need to know what goat or wild goat, or sow in the Book of Mormon is really referring to to understand the text. If the use of the words goat and wild goat in the Book of Mormon are dependent on the KJV Old Testament, then there is something else going on that gets lost when we try to read with substitutes (and this is true for both critic and believer - not recognizing that connection changes the meaning of the text). Anyway, just a couple of thoughts here.

[Benjamin McGuire]

I think claiming that an item is not an anachronism because Joseph simply copied it out of the Bible is a very clever use of apologetics.

I really don't follow this logic. If Joseph Smith copied something out of the Bible it is be definition not an anachronism.

That's part of what makes this discussion so odd in its own ways - and the reason why I keep having to make that statement about the believer's perspective. The only way something in the Book of Mormon can be anachronistic is if we start from the assumption that the Book of Mormon is in fact a translation of an ancient text - and that the anachronistic material should be assigned to the alleged ancient source.

If Joseph Smith just copies it - then it isn't out of place at all - and what that means is that in arguing that there are anachronisms in the Book of Mormon, the critic is also adopting (for the purposes of the argument) the position that the Book of Mormon is a translation of an ancient text and that the anachronistic elements should be understood as coming from that ancient source and are not artifacts of the translation process. Does that make sense? And this is why I have suggested a couple of times that it is only from the perspective of the believer that any of this is remotely interesting. If it's all Joseph Smith, then there really is nothing remotely interesting about goats and wild goats, or horses, or sows. Then, what is really interesting is the theory of literary interpretation, the christology, the interpretation of kingship as read in the Old Testament, the arguments about the just war, and so on.

[Benjamin McGuire]

Benjamin, are you and Grant Hardy aligned, generally speaking, in the way you approach the Book of Mormon text? Also, to be clear, are you saying that with a few modifications (and are they critical in regards to historicity vs. non-historicity) you are supportive of the general thrust of Ostler's Expansion Theory?

I have never personally spoken with Grant. I have read some of his material. I think that we have some shared interests and beliefs - and we are both more interested in the literary nature of the text than it is historicity. I am less interested (than I think that Grant is) over the issue of how it was written. I think that some of the views that focus on this have some degree of absurdity in them. I don't think that you can be an academic engaged in literary interpretation without recognizing the problems associated with the idea of a text being able to perfectly convey the meaning intended by an author - but this is a view that much of Mormonism has adopted from the larger Christianity and their view of scripture as inerrant and perfectly self-revealing. I am comfortable with the idea that there can be several different ways to approach this issue that will offer different mileage. I am also under no illusion that my own readings are in some way perfect - I do not offer a "key" to understanding scriptures.

As a member of the church that is interested in some of these topics/issues but not having the in depth training that you have I...many years ago...came to believe that if the Book of Mormon was anywhere in the ballpark of 'true' it had to be a hybrid product of some kind. A simple (Joseph Smith)...and yet complex (Hardy's analysis)...product out of the mind of Joseph Smith and Co., AND a composite (God, other contributors, existing canon/scripture) piece of 'inspired' (with actual plates being the catalyst source material) that meets the qualification of "translated through the gift and power of God".

I really love that phrase "translated through the gift and power of God" because it carries a bunch of meaning with it. Joseph Smith uses it to describe what he does with the Book of Mormon precisely because it occurs within the Book of Mormon (right near the end of the translated material). Or, if I were a skeptic, I might swap that around, right? Joseph puts it into the Book of Mormon precisely because he has used it elsewhere to describe what he is doing. In any case, it's a term that in the context of Joseph's description of the Book of Mormon already engages with the text and what the text claims that others have done. I don't envy anyone the chore of trying to separate what came from Joseph Smith and what came from the gold plates - nor would I likely find a set of criteria for separating the two that I would be comfortable with ...

Grant Hardy tackles the text in the Book of Mormon from what appears to be a very honest and straightforward literary exegesis of the text and doesn't seem to pull any punches. You seem to take that same approach. Hardy, when he goes home at night and away from his academic 'tower' has said, to the best of my knowledge, that he believes in the historicity of the Book of Mormon. That is, there were Lehites. There were brass plates. The Jaradite colony exisited, etc.

I would only suggest that Hardy, like myself, probably is not a fan of the word historicity. It is easier to believe in a historical Book of Mormon. Historicity carries with it a lot of problematic baggage.

When you take your academic hat off and you go to church on Sunday are you on the same page as those, whom as you've said really don't give this stuff much thought, who read and see the Book of Mormon as an actual book of scripture that has its origins as stated on the title page?

I am a fan of sitting in church and in my head, giving the lesson that I would have given, or the talk I would have delivered. But, I live in northern Michigan, and my branch doesn't have a lot of regularly attending members. An the Church's new Sunday School format means that the very limited time is mostly spent on doctrinal sorts of things rather than the text and reading the text. So ... it's part of why its not much of an issue for most, I think.

[I Have Questions]

If we talk instead about the fact that the modern Book of Mormon using the King James text as part of its rhetorical ("translation") strategy, issues like this, issues like the goat and wild goat, issues like the word "sow" are clearly placed into the modern text - and we stop getting sidetracked by this back and forth. This won't make potential issues with the text disappear - but what it will do is to move most of the superficial ones off of the table so that we can have a much more interesting conversation about what the text is trying to do rather than what it is merely saying. This isn't really a complete description of what I mean, but it is a starting point.

Yes. I think if we accept that the Book of Mormon isn’t a translation of what was on ancient gold plates, but instead was something produced by Joseph Smith in the 19th century, in part by plagiarising the KJV Bible and other available texts, then it is definitely a different discussion.

It certainly removes the question about how the KJV Bible content got onto the gold plates, and instead we can discuss the why’s and wherefore’s of why Joseph chose to insert KJV Bible content into a fictitious narrative about the origins of the indigenous people of America.

I’m not sure that the First Presidency or Q12 would want such a notion to take seed within the membership, but I find your acceptance of what seems obvious rather refreshing.

[Benjamin McGuire]

This is defined as a suspension of disbelief, which I do frequently in Sci fi fiction in order to consider the concept and discuss its implications. But I would never imply that my suspension of disbelief means I do believe. This strategy may muddy the waters with apologetics.

This suspension of disbelief is definitely the way it is referred to when we talk about reading fiction. But there is a broader understanding of this that I prefer in narrative theory - as I outline it in that essay that I linked to. We tend to group everything into these dichotomies - truth and fiction being one of them. When we start talking about genres and rhetorical strategies that don't fit so neatly into this dichotomy, the term isn't so useful. It's like the old joke (which has lots of variants) where a muffin is baking in the oven and turns to the one next to him, and says, "It's getting warm in here" and the other muffin says "Holy cow, a talking muffin." Part of this goes back to my reflections here that when we try to make it all about the historicty, we get distracted from the meaning of the text.

[Benjamin McGuire]

As far as the rest goes, I am not generally a fan of critiquing an argument simply by pointing out what's wrong with it[.]

Man, you must have hated the old FARMS Review of Books.

When I was a young adult, I thought they were awesome. And I was looking for anything that would give me greater insight into the Book of Mormon. And perhaps this led to a search for understanding that has given me the experience and knowledge to feel comfortable charting my own path.

[Marcus]

This is defined as a suspension of disbelief, which I do frequently in Sci fi fiction in order to consider the concept and discuss its implications. But I would never imply that my suspension of disbelief means I do believe. This strategy may muddy the waters with apologetics.

This suspension of disbelief is definitely the way it is referred to when we talk about reading fiction. But there is a broader understanding of this that I prefer in narrative theory - as I outline it in that essay that I linked to. We tend to group everything into these dichotomies - truth and fiction being one of them. When we start talking about genres and rhetorical strategies that don't fit so neatly into this dichotomy, the term isn't so useful. It's like the old joke (which has lots of variants) where a muffin is baking in the oven and turns to the one next to him, and says, "It's getting warm in here" and the other muffin says "Holy cow, a talking muffin." Part of this goes back to my reflections here that when we try to make it all about the historicity, we get distracted from the meaning of the text.

I haven't heard that joke! I'll take a look at the essay, thanks, it's an interesting topic, and I'd like to learn more. My position for now remains the same, but I'm open to learning more of what you are theorizing.

To explain my take further, in the Catholic way of thinking (which I studied slightly after leaving the LDS religion) I see much more of that mindset where historicity is not a significant issue, nor even addressed in any regular or specific way, and certainly not the way Mormon apologists do. I no longer read much in the way of contemporary catholic apologetic works, however, so maybe I'm missing it.

Comparatively, I grew up LDS, where in every possible setting, the historicity of the Book of Mormon was inextricable from the meaning of the text. Is Book of Mormon historicity no longer taught like that in LDS settings? I suppose it would have to be played down, but to me the text having meaning simply requires it.

Without the historicity it is simply fiction, and calling it a narrative doesn't blur the line as to whether or not it is fictional. If anything, attaching divine meaning to a fictional narrative draws even more attention to the human author. Finding inspiration in what this author wrote, an author who expressed beliefs that were very representative of his time and derivative of many other contemporary works, would still require a significant suspension of disbelief for me.