My wife and I have just returned from hearing Jack Welch deliver the 2017 Laura F. Willes Book of Mormon Lecture at the Assembly Hall of the Gordon B. Hinckley Center at BYU. The title of his remarks was “Hours Never to Be Forgotten: Timing the Book of Mormon Translation.”
He’s spent decades, off and on, considering the question of the translation timeline for the Book of Mormon; his most recent publication on the subject appears in the second edition of his edited volume Opening the Heavens: Accounts of Divine Manifestations, 1820–1844.
He argues, in meticulous detail, that the translation/dictation of the Book of Mormon covered a period of, at most, seventy-five (75) days — and, very probably, substantially less than that. But even assuming the maximum period of seventy-five days, and using Royal Skousen’s figure of 269,510 words for the entire text of the Book of Mormon, that’s a torrid pace. It comes out to just slightly under 3594 dictated words per day. And if the number of days comes closer to fifty-seven (57), which is one of the figures that Jack mentioned, it goes even higher: at 47 translation days, the sum is 4728.25 words daily. Even a very fluent and experienced writer would find it difficult to compose at such a pace — and to do it day after day after day for 2.5 months would be a very impressive achievement.
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A week from tomorrow, on Thursday, 16 November 2017, the Wheatley Institution at Brigham Young University will be sponsoring another iteration of its annual conference devoted to the topic of “Reason for Hope: Responding to a Secular World.”
The four speakers for the conference, which will be held in the Hinckley Center Assembly Hall, will be Daniel Peterson (10 AM), Jenet Erickson (11 AM), C. Terry Warner (1 PM), and Julie Beck (2 PM). The conference will close with a panel Q&A session at 3 PM.
For further information on the conference, see here:
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Some of you, no doubt, have been aware of and following this terribly sad story, about a young Chinese returned missionary named ChenWei Guo, who was pointlessly killed a few days ago on or near the campus of the University of Utah by a wandering lowlife:
“Slain LDS Chinese Student Had Remarkable Conversion Story”
“‘He was always happy’: Family, friends remember slain U. student at funeral”
Heartbreaking.
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It’s fitting, in this context, to mention the following:
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In a somewhat different mood and vein, I call this to your attention:
“LDS Church Addresses Misunderstood DNA Evidence”
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A personal note from Neal Rappleye that some of you will find interesting, not least because it offers links to some worthwhile reading:
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A podcast that’s accessible via the website of the Interpreter Foundation:
“The Christ Who Heals,” with Fiona Givens
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