{"id":69001,"date":"2019-01-06T22:25:26","date_gmt":"2019-01-07T05:25:26","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/admin.patheos.com\/blogs\/danpeterson\/?p=69001"},"modified":"2019-01-06T22:25:26","modified_gmt":"2019-01-07T05:25:26","slug":"on-some-literally-hard-facts-at-the-beginning-of-the-restoration","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/danpeterson\/2019\/01\/on-some-literally-hard-facts-at-the-beginning-of-the-restoration.html","title":{"rendered":"On some literally hard facts at the beginning of the Restoration"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<\/head>

\u00a0<\/p>\n

\"Golden<\/a>
The Angel Moroni gives the golden plates to Joseph Smith
(Painting by Kenneth Riley, from LDS.org)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

I published this column in the Deseret News<\/em> back on 3 December 2015:<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

One way of explaining the Book of Mormon, if Joseph Smith\u2019s own explanation is rejected, is to regard it as merely the product of Joseph\u2019s subjective imagination \u2014 whether that imagination is judged to have been sincerely deceived or, for whatever motives, deceptive and dishonest.<\/span><\/p>\n

The historical evidence, though, seems lethal to such theories. And it\u2019s instructive to note that, while modern skeptics commonly assume that the golden plates never existed, many of Joseph\u2019s very earliest persecutions came because some of his neighbors were completely convinced that he had them.<\/span><\/p>\n

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\u201cThese records,\u201d Joseph later wrote, \u201cwere engraven on plates which had the appearance of gold, each plate was six inches wide and eight inches long and not quite so thick as common tin. They were filled with engravings, in Egyptian characters and bound together in a volume, as the leaves of a book with three rings running through the whole. The volume was something near six inches in thickness.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Why, if he were merely pretending, go into such detail? Wouldn\u2019t it have been easier simply to have claimed inspiration, without manufacturing ancient civilizations or claiming to possess tangible ancient artifacts? After all, as Anthony Sweat observes in his excellent chapter in the new book \u201cThe Coming Forth of the Book of Mormon: A Marvelous Work and a Wonder,\u201d edited by Dennis Largey, Andrew Hedges, John Hilton III and Kerry Hull, this was how most of the revelations in the Doctrine and Covenants were received:<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cJoseph Smith did not describe the coming forth of the Book of Mormon the way he described many of his revelations found in the Doctrine and Covenants: as inspired words of the Lord that came to his mind and that he then dictated to a scribe. No, Joseph said the Book of Mormon came forth from a nearby hill, by removing dirt, using a lever to lift a large stone, and removing actual engraved plates and sacred interpreters for the translation of its inscriptions. The Book of Mormon didn\u2019t just pass through Joseph\u2019s trance-induced revelatory mind: its palpable relics passed through a clothing frock, hollowed log, cooper\u2019s shop, linen napkin, wooden chest, fireplace hearth, and barrel of beans.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Sweat\u2019s article lays out some of the salient evidence by examining \u201cmultiple historical accounts of persons who interacted with actual, physical, tangible objects\u201d that, \u201ctaken collectively,\u201d \u201cprovide compelling evidence to the truthfulness of Joseph Smith\u2019s account of the Book of Mormon\u2019s ancient origins.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Such accounts don\u2019t prove the Book of Mormon ancient, divine, or even correctly translated \u2014 no single piece or type of historical evidence can cover everything \u2014 but what Sweat terms the \u201cindisputable physicality\u201d of the plates and related relics goes a very long way toward establishing the plausibility of Joseph\u2019s overall story and claim.<\/span><\/p>\n

For example, Sweat considers the stone box in which the artifacts of the Book of Mormon were preserved on the side of the Hill Cumorah. Several witnesses, both believers and nonbelievers, apparently knew the place where it had been, and some may even have seen it. Lucy Mack Smith reported that she had seen and held both the Urim and Thummim and the breast-plate found in the box, describing both of them in strikingly concrete detail. And, if there were no \u201cactual relics hefted and handled, touched and transported, from one place to another and by one person to another,\u201d all the stories about such things, and about the great efforts expended to protect the plates from people seeking to steal them, represent nothing more than a charade.<\/span><\/p>\n

Looking at the same sorts of evidence, Mormon scholar Terryl Givens has remarked of Joseph Smith, \u201cThis continual, extensive, and prolonged engagement with a tangible, grounding artifact is not compatible with a theory that makes him an inspired writer reworking the stuff of his own dreams into a product worthy of the name scripture.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

If the \u201ckeystone\u201d of Mormonism<\/a> was delivered wrapped in fabrications, regarding it as nevertheless somehow \u201ctrue\u201d becomes \u2014 to put it mildly \u2014 much more difficult. Like the bodily resurrection of Christ from death, the physicality of the Book of Mormon \u2014 recovered from a dead pre-Columbian civilization \u2014 resists attempts to treat it as merely symbol or metaphor. It forthrightly demands to be understood as literally, tangibly true. It virtually forces a sharp decision.<\/span><\/p>\n

I strongly suggest Sweat\u2019s summary of the available evidence to any who might be interested in pursuing this subject. Believers can be heartened, and honest skeptics should find themselves challenged.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

\u00a0 \u00a0 I published this column in the Deseret News back on 3 December 2015: \u00a0 One way of explaining the Book of Mormon, if Joseph Smith\u2019s own explanation is rejected, is to regard it as merely the product of Joseph\u2019s subjective imagination \u2014 whether that imagination is judged to have been sincerely deceived or, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1019,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-69001","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"yoast_head":"\nOn some literally hard facts at the beginning of the Restoration<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"    I published this column in the Deseret News back on 3 December 2015:   One way of explaining the Book of Mormon, if Joseph Smith\u2019s own\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, 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