Talk:Book of Mormon controversies

There has been much more discussion than is currently on this page. Early discussion has been archived at Talk:Book_of_Mormon_controversies/Archive_1

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Could add mention of the ye/you/thou mix up - p.stoltz

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I remember reading about Smith finding the words "Cumorah" and "Moroni" (the hill where he found the tablets, and the angel) on a map, referring to the Comoros Islands and the city of Moroni, and that was another piece of evidence that he just made it up. Maybe that should be added as well, if anyone can find it. (I won't add it, because I don't think I can be neutral about the subject...) Adam Bishop 01:50 3 Jul 2003 (UTC)

It also could be a supporting point to the Book of Mormon as well. The island was 'discovered' by polynesian settlers about 600 A.D. (Mormon's believe that polynesians are descendants of Book of Mormon peoples) who could have carried the name with them.

However, it is not likely that Joseph Smith would have seen the name of the capital city Moroni on any map as it became the capital city in 1876, many years after Smith died. Due to the small size of the city prior to that time, it is unlikely that it would have appeared on any map available to Smith or most Americans.

The capital Moroni's name is French and Italian in orgin. Link to some history of the island:

• http://www.africatravelling.net/comoros/moroni/moroni_history.htm
• http://www.odci.gov/cia/publications/factbook/geos/cn.html

Some Mormon apologists sites about the Island:

• http://www.geocities.com/rameumptom/bom/comoros.html
• [1] (http://nephiproject.com/Moroni's%20Harbor.htm)

-Visorstuff

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Book of Mormon controversies or Book of Mormon origin controversies are better titles. "Regarding" is clumsy, anti-WP:STYLE, and just plain big for its transitive meaning (which can be eliminated altogether.) -戴&#30505sv 01:13, Sep 5, 2003 (UTC)

I ain't moving it again! It's already been Authenticity of The Book of Mormon and Origin of The Book of Mormon in the last 2 days. It might as well be consistent with Controversies regarding Mormonism. Either change one or neither. I don't like Book of Mormon controversies as that might be another topic entirely. The title ought to reflect that this particular controversy is just over the origin, as opposed to general controversies about the book. I'm not quite sure what was wrong with the original Origin of The Book of Mormon title as this page could include the controversies without saying in the title that it was doing so. See also Wikipedia:Naming_conventions_(precision). Angela 01:50, 5 Sep 2003 (UTC)

What in the world have you folks been doing? Why in the world was this article moved from Authenticity of The Book of Mormon ESPECIALLY WITHOUT ANY DISCUSSION BEFOREHAND?! LOOK at the contents of the article folks; it does not merely cover "origins" and is not intended to cover merely origins. The article is intended to cover exactly what the original article was titled, not the overly-complicated less neutral title it has now...the title was well thought out. What reason is there for changing it now? B 22:35, 5 Sep 2003 (UTC)

I was the one that moved it but that was done to fix a cut and paste 'move' done by User:216.160.222.234 rather than because I thought it should be moved. The 2nd move was for the same reason, after Tom (aka Hawstom) cut/pasted it into its current title. Angela 22:52, 5 Sep 2003 (UTC)

Thanks for the explanations, the forebearance, and the patience. Hang on while I get up to speed on all the style issues, etc. You guys are great. Tom

戴&#30505sv's suggestion above makes the most sense. Rather than moving this article back to its original page, Authenticity of The Book of Mormon--which is still far better than the current ill-named page--Book of Mormon controversies fits well for the move. B 18:16, 2 Oct 2003 (UTC)

I apologize for diving in and marring the page before becoming thoroughly trained in Wikiness. I don't know that I will be back anytime soon, and I really regret the mess I made. Y'all go ahead and do what you have to do, and I will forebear making any other changes until I learn a bit more. Hawstom 21:55, 3 Dec 2003 (UTC)

OK. I like the current title, Book of Mormon controversies. It's NPOV and it's general. Thanks for the guidance. Hawstom 23:03, 3 Dec 2003 (UTC)

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This quote on the page is incorrect...well different. The part about faith is correct.

[quote] Believers in the Book of Mormon, however, point to a statement made by Joseph Smith, to the effect that the only real doctrines of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints are Faith, Repentance, and Baptism, and that all other doctrines and practices are but appendages to those tenets. [/quote]

This is the actual quote

[quote] “The Fundamental principles of our religion are the testimony of the Apostles and prophets, concerning Jesus Christ, that He died, was buried, and rose again the third day, and ascended into heaven; and all other things which pertain to our religion are only appendages to it.” Joseph Smith, History of the Church 3:30. [/quote]

That Jesus is the Christ is the main message of the Church, and the main message of the Book of Mormon.

This quote puzzles me:

[quote] They comment that no official statement on the humanity of God has been been made since it is unrelated to those 3 things; [/quote]

what exactly is meant by "the humanity of God"? waldemer

This is not really related to the Book of Mormon, or this article, but here's my question. If the quote written above is true, why do LDS believers spend a lot of effort trying to convert me from my current position (A Protestant Christian who believes all of the above) to their position? DJ Clayworth 22:03, 3 Dec 2003 (UTC)

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We still need to deal with science, history and geography, and that isn't being done here at all. The Book of Mormon makes far more than theological claims; it also makes dozens of geographical, linguistic and historical claims. Each one has been shown to be unsupportable. How one chooses to deal with the gap between scientific consensus and the claims made by Mormons is up to the individual, but the gap exists. Writing in the independent Mormon scholarly journal Dialogue, Mesoamerican archaeologist Michael Coe of Yale University states clearly that: RK

"As far as I know there is not one professionally trained archaeologist, who is not a Mormon, who sees any scientific justification for believing the foregoing (that Hebrew immigrants build a civilization in ancient America as described in the Book of Mormon) to be true, and I would like to state that there are quite a few Mormon archaeologists who join this group."

This imporant issues cannot be glossed over, as it currently is. RK

Agreed. In doing so, let's include plenty of references so everything is open to scrutiny. It will be interesting to explore this area. Q

Agreed. For example, the Coe statement above should probably be worked into the beginning of the Archeology section. I'll give it a shot. RK or anyone, do you have a year and volume for the Dialogue issue? B

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I've followed RK's lead in retracting/rephrasing statements. There is more material that could be retracted including people besides RK and me. I'll continue to make retractions of my own material if appropriate and relevant to other's retractions. Haha..should we call this talk page a chalkboard instead? B

Feel the love... :)

From the article: Various alternate explanations for the origin of The Book of Mormon have been proposed - do we know who proposed each of these? Anyone got references? I find this kind of historical detective work interesting, so I'd love to see the sources... -Martin

I wouldn't be surprised if the first two go all the way back to Joseph Smith's time. The third and fourth I think are really references to the same book written by a preacher named Ethan Smith (no relation) who lived in the same town as Joseph. This book speculates about the Native Americans having Israeli origins, among other things. I don't know who originally proposed this, but I believe B. H. Roberts is said to have wondered about it in his personal writings. Q

These alternate explanations were introduced very early and have been presented many times by very many critics. Handling attribution to the originator of long-standing critical or alternate views (or variations thereof) in general may be difficult to track down in some cases. I believe the contributor of the various explanations is referring to Solomon Spaulding's Manuscript Found and that the various explanations are variations of the cases arising from that controversy. Dr. Philastus Hurlburt was the first to make this case around 1833 not long after he had been excommunicated from the LDS church. For an LDS view of this controversy, see Michael Ash's summary on this subject. [2] (http://www.mormonfortress.com/spauld2.html). Most experienced critics do not advocate this position any more, but it is probably good to include it at the very least to show it as a prominent case in the history of LDS criticism B

So there we have it, Ethan Smith or Solomon Spaulding controversy. Good example of how non-attribution creates ambiguity. The contributor will have to let us know what he had in mind. B

Here is a link to an article printed in the LDS Church's flagship monthly magazine, The Ensign which talks about both of these theories together. [3] (http://library.lds.org/nxt/gateway.dll/Magazines/Ensign/1976.htm/ensign%20september%201976.htm/i%20have%20a%20question.htm?fn=document-frame.htm&f=templates&2.0). You'll have to scroll down to find the article. Since the article is coming from a Church publication, notice how the top of the page-link states: "Questions of general gospel interest answered for guidance, not as official statements of Church policy." B

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I looked at some of the other pages from religious groups. The ones I looked at do not have imbedded criticisms on the main page, with the exception of Scientology. My feeling is that religions are based on faith, and as such are subject to scientific criticism - eg the noah story's world wide flood. I would like to see such science vs religion debates moved off the main page of religious groups. When I go to the mormon page, I want to know what they believe, the tenants of their religion. I don't need to know that Mormon is not based on science. That is the nature of faith. Karl

There are no embedded criticisms on Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, that I can see. No mention of science, certainly.

I think this article, being about the book of mormon, is an appropriate place to put questions and discussion on the authenticity of the book itself. In particular, the physical characteristics of the supposed golden plates, the use of language, changes in differing revisions - that's all totally relevant. On the other hand, the content under the heading "Archeological", does seem to me to be misplaced, because it's more a criticism of LDS than of the book itself. -Martin

It does seem odd, but the Archeological section is properly placed with matters concerning the Authenticity of the Book of Mormon. Archeological issues arise out of specific reference to the BoM than out of any issue general to LDS. There are statements outside the BoM in regards to archeological issues, but these statements typical coincide with references in the BoM. In considering the very unlikely possibility that the LDS discarded the BoM, no obvious archeological issue remains which is pertinent to the LDS in general. B

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The question still is why do Mormon's get this treatment and not some other religions. Using the heading Archeological would be to hide the criticism. Why not use a link like "Criticism" or "Scientific Questions".

This is a big problem of misperception here! Both Judaism and Christianity ARE given exactly the same treatment! Just read the entries! Both of these religions depend on the belief that God dictated his words to Moses and later prophets. But read the entries on what Wikipedia has to say on these issues, especially the article on the Documentary hypothesis. Traditional Christians and Orthodox Jews view this as heresy, as slander, as hatespeech against God. I personally read a book-review by Orthodox Rabbi Avi Shafran, who called higher biblical criticism an anti-Semitic blood libel! So make no mistake - Many Jews and Christians are angry and outraged about the even-handed way that Wikipedia discusses such issues of history for all faiths. RK

I have to agree with RK here. Most religions on wikipedia have their share of criticism in related articles; most of that winds being fairly even-handed, when the dust finally settles. If any religion has actually received less criticism, it's far more likely to be because of simple neglect or oversight, than because of any grand conspiracy. In all cases, writers try to follow the standard procedures: document sources, maintain a neutral tone and neutral point of view, correctly attribute opinions and beliefs to those who hold them, etc. etc. It's not always easy, but can be a helpful writing exercise in its own right. Wesley 17:17 Dec 11, 2002 (UTC)

first a correction: I was comparing book of mormon to things like Scientology, as opposed to bible, and koran, and for that matter new testement. The article on the Documentary hypothesis is exactly my point - it is not merged, but is a separate article. Trash mormonism all you like - what I know about it, I do not like. On the other hand, if I want to find out more about the religion I don't want to have to sift through a scientific rebuttle of a religion. If I decide to delve still deeper, then I will want dome of the scientific rebuttle information. There is no scientific rebuttle of the bible on the article the bible page, maybe I missed it? Karl

I suggest that a main page be created for topics like "Authenticity of The Book of Mormon" and then in the main page in the Book of Mormon a similar subheading with a sentence or two and a link to the "Authenticity" page. If a separate page is not created for "Authenticity" the main Book of Mormon page will become unwieldy with point-counterpoints. In my experience, critics of the LDS Church have not let anything go unnoticed (as with a lot of other religions) and have challenged just about anything that could be challenged. The points and counter-points go on and on. One of my hopes is that this wikipedia project can get a handle on the great amount of work that has been invested by the various sides of LDS criticisms. I suggest a page named something like "Criticism (LDS)". The heading could start with a proviso similar to the one now currently stated on the BoM page under the "Authenticity" section. Then the Criticism page could have points-counterpoints for general criticisms and also include brief statements and links to criticisms on specific topics like "Authenticity of The Book of Mormon", "Legitimacy of the LDS Priesthood", "Danites in the LDS Church", "Authenticity of the Book of Abraham", etc. Any comments or suggestions on this proposal? Would this be going beyond the scope of the wiki project? cataloguing and summarizing the criticisms and the responses thereto? Should an attempt be made to catalogue all/most/only prominent criticisms? What criteria to use if only certain criticisms are to be giving attention? B

Having seen the page now that that's done, I'm not convinced. I think it's allowing the "official" origin of the book to take precedence over the view from outside the church. What if you moved the stuff about other possible origins back into the entry, so you had:

• Intro
• The Story
• The Origin
  • Delivered by angels, etc
  • It never existed, Joseph made it up
  • It was a modified copy of an unpublished historical novel
  • It was created by aliens from the planet Zog
  • For further discussion of which origin story is most likely, see Authenticity of The Book of Mormon

That would achieve your aim of moving the complexities of the authenticty arguments out of this entry, but without allowing the Church version to proceed "unchallenged". What do you think? -Martin

Personally, I like the Zog theory :) Q

If you've never been there in the off season, I strongly recommend it...no crowds, more oxygen, less inter-galactic battles, etc. :o) B

Martin, yea, I'd like to see it consistent with how the Bible page is done, and looking at its page now I think that is how its page will shape up too. Rather than move, I copied since that material seems to be useful for both pages. B

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The newest contribution from "P Stoltzfus" apparently at the University of Quebec is problematic. Why the random addition of "allegedly" Why not include it in other paragraphs? How does "P" intend to apply this rule in content summaries of other sacred texts? B

The article noted that a particular book was written in 385AD. This is seriously questioned. I don't mean it as a cut against mormonism. I will try to stop contributing to wikipedia however accept for articles i may have already written. I don't want to feel personally attacked, wikipedia is not worth being targeted over. - p stoltz. (how did you know I'm at the U of Q?) perhaps you didn't mean it as an attack against me personally in which case I apologize.

There is no personal attack here. I'm questioning your problematic addition, not because it's a cut against mormonism but because it is random and inconsistent. Few will argue that the subject is not debatable, seriously or otherwise. That's not the point. And you haven't answered the primary question. Why the randomness when the "allegedly" could be included to many more paragraphs in this section, in this article, in other articles, etc.? I used http://visualroute.visualware.com/ to identify where you were. B

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I cleaned up the headings to make the page easier to read. Hawstom 23:38, 3 Dec 2003 (UTC)

So far I've been unimpressed with your changes. I cut for instance this uninformative banality:

"Apologists defend Smith's claim. Critics claim that the book had some other origin.

Arguments between apologists and critics generally are embodied in two broad categories. In one category, apologists defend Smith's claim while critics rebut it. In the other category, the apologists and critics switch roles, with critics defending alternative explanations while apologists rebut them."

Surely, this goes without saying...unless this encyclopedia is intended for grade-schoolers. B 07:36, Dec 7, 2003 (UTC)

It's up to you. I think sometimes in technical writing it is okay to state the obvious for organizational purposes.

"Source" plates?! What is that supposed to be? B 07:57, Dec 7, 2003 (UTC)

How about my latest attempt, Source text? The point is that a major area of contention is over those "Gold Plates". 1) Smith made up a bad story about them and 2) Nobody ever saw them. It is important to reduce all this high-sounding talk down to the core contentions and organize it along those lines.

This line is also cut for been uninformative:

"Critics argue that the failure of the Church to treat the Book of Mormon seriously casts doubt on Smith's claim."

"Seriously"?! That is too vague. State something concrete and it might be useful to leave in there. B 08:45, Dec 7, 2003 (UTC)

Just trying to make sense of the arguments. I am beginning to think this argument is NOT about the Book of Mormon, but about the LDS Church. It isn't NPOV to equate Mormonism, BofM, and LDS. There are other Mormons, etc. The BofM stands apart from LDS as an 1830 production (previous to any church) of Smith. Is there a place we could move or a better way we can outline this whole bit about textual changes and inconsistency with LDS doctrine? I would like to see LDS simply removed from this page as inapplicable to other Mormon branches.

There are some serious problems here that forming a consistent hierarchy will help to reveal and resolve. The textual additions I propose(d) are/were merely to attempt to make some sense of the page content and proposed hierarchy (outline). I will keep trying. We DO need to hierarchy. And I could sure use some help crafting it. :-D Hawstom 18:50, 11 Dec 2003 (UTC)

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Somebody added the Book of Abraham to the Archealogy section. With apologies, I deleted it. But this addition reveals a problem with the Archealogy section. Namely, what do the Kinderhook plates, Bat Creek stones, etc have to do with BofM archealogy? If I delete the Book of Abraham, are the other also questionable. I suppose not, since the Book of Abraham is about the old world, but the others are about the New World.

Whew. Sometimes it is hard to understand how some of these "arguments" fit in. Hawstom 03:59, 13 Dec 2003 (UTC)

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Splitting up this article

Rather than having an article named Book of Mormon controversies, wouldn't it be better to have more topical articles that discuss each aspect of the book that is controversial? For example, why don't we slice up this article and make articles such as the following: Archaeology and the Book of Mormon, Book of Mormon authorship, Book of Mormon linguistics, Book of Mormon alterations, etc.? Then, on the main Book of Mormon page, there could be links to these articles such as the following: "According to the Title Page, the main author of the Book of Mormon was named Mormon, and that the book was translated by Joseph Smith; however, critics offer the following other explanations: <short list>. See Book of Mormon Authorship."? COGDEN 08:24, 16 Dec 2003 (UTC)

Seconded. B 16:11, Dec 16, 2003 (UTC)

That isn't a bad idea. Angela suggested possibly renaming the page to get rid of the word controversies, and I was thinking a name something along the lines of BofM Studies or BofM Origin might be good. But I may like your idea even better. I do think they all need to start with BofM. Hawstom 15:50, 16 Dec 2003 (UTC)

There is another important consideration. Book of Mormon Studies have suffered from a lack of respectful dialogue between camps. Having a Controversies page in the Wikipedia is good for the maturation of Book of Mormon Studies. But it may not be good for Wikipedia. Maybe the whole body of extraneous dialogue needs to be scrapped, and the main Book of Mormon page needs to contain just key facts about the BofM, both commendable and embarrassing. One of the principles of NPOV is, "Let the story be told as it is." Validity and absurdity are in the eye of the beholder. A strict policy can be stated in HTML comment at the top of the page: "Wikipedia is not a forum for arguments about the Book of Mormon. Please stick to facts and statements that are conceded by those both apologetic of and critical of the Book of Mormon." Hawstom 15:50, 16 Dec 2003 (UTC)

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This is really a tough issue.

• The Mormonism Controversy is an issue unto itself. Has resulted in deaths on both sides. Deserves an article with some name.
• We should have only one main Mormonism Controversy article. All other Mormonism articles should not be Controversy oriented.
• Disputes about the Book of Mormon could be organized on the Mormonism Controversy article, with pointers to various more general articles on American Archealogy, Book of Mormon Chiasmus, Solomon Spaulding, Book of Mormon Animals, etc.

I don't think any article should have the word controversy in the title, unless the article is about the fact of controversy, like what causes the controversy, what effects the controversy has on the dialog, etc. (and in that case, it should be named "Controversy and X"). The problem lies in the word "controversy": "Controversies regarding X" could mean anything, and it encourages people to conduct edit wars. I don't think you would never see a "Controversies regarding X" page in the Encyclopedia Brittanica, because it is assumed that any good, factual article about any subject will mention the major controversies involved, and not collage them together in a Frankenstein page. COGDEN 05:32, 3 Jan 2004 (UTC)

As a pilot effort, I've created the article Archaeology and The Book of Mormon, and moved archeology materials from Book of Mormon controversies to that page. Please comment. COGDEN 21:58, 3 Jan 2004 (UTC)

Golden Plates Page

Beginning of a Gold Plates article. Hawstom 07:11, 22 Dec 2003 (UTC)

Redirect this article to Book of Mormon?

I've moved all the material in this article either back to Book of Mormon or to new articles, including Archaeology and the Book of Mormon, Linguistics and the Book of Mormon, and Golden Plates. This article is now a skeleton. Should we delete the material and make it a redirect to Book of Mormon?COGDEN 23:20, 16 Jan 2004 (UTC)

I agree. The article looks a bit strange in it's current format. Angela. 00:50, Jan 21, 2004 (UTC)

I agree as well, however, we need to figure out how to properly preserve this talk page & archives as it has many decisions and issues that were worked out here first and the reasoning why. Perhap adding it as an archived page to Book of Mormon? -Visorstuff 01:47, 21 Jan 2004 (UTC)

It might be best moved to Talk:Book of Mormon/Controversies, although it could just stay here but with links from other relevant talk pages. See also Wikipedia:How to archive a talk page.Angela. 23:27, Jan 21, 2004 (UTC)

Done. This page is now defunct COGDEN 16:16, 27 Jan 2004 (UTC)