NY Times Article on Dissaffected Swedish Area Authority

[Harry Tic]

Doesn't that concept come from 2 Ne. 31, or is there an OT/NT basis for it? I'm wondering about circularity.

I think you can find hints of it in Isaiah 55 ("my ways are not your ways") and probably other places besides. But at any rate, I'm not too worried about circularity. Circles are only a problem if they're too small, particularly when it comes to religion (i.e, you could make the same argument about any appeal to scriptural authority). I don't think most people that are religious on some level would reject the idea that God gives us what we need in the form in which we can accept it. In that sense, I don't think that the truthfulness of the claim made in 2 Ne. 31:3 is problematic.

[SoCalCoug]

You're correct about the "can of worms". However, I don't think the U&T was part of the BofA translation.

Oh, I'm sure you're right. But . . .

https://www.lds.org/ensign/1988/07/i...stion?lang=eng

A second explanation takes into consideration what Joseph Smith meant by the word translation. While translating the Book of Mormon, he used the Urim and Thummim rather than dictionaries and grammars of the language. Translating with the Urim and Thummim is evidently a much different process than using the tools of scholarly research.

Section seven of the Doctrine and Covenants provides us with a good example of that process. It is a revelation given to the Prophet through the Urim and Thummim of a translation of a “record made on parchment by John [the Revelator] and hidden up by himself.” (See section heading to D&C 7.) In other words, the document being translated wasn’t even in the Prophet’s possession; yet by means of the Urim and Thummim he was able to translate it.

His translation of the Bible, parts of which are in the book of Moses in the Pearl of Great Price, was also done without having the original text before him. Instead, while he was using the King James Version of the Bible, the correct meaning or content was revealed to him, including extensive revelations of both Enoch and Moses that are not found in the King James Version.

We can envision a possible similar process taking place in Joseph Smith’s translation of the papyri he got from Michael Chandler. Instead of making a literal translation, as scholars would use the term, he used the Urim and Thummim as a means of receiving revelation. Even though a copy of Abraham’s record possibly passed through the hands of many scribes and had become editorially corrupted to the point where it may have had little resemblance to the original, the Prophet—with the Urim and Thummim, or simply through revelation—could have obtained the translation—or, as Joseph Smith used the word, he could have received the meaning, or subject-matter content of the original text, as he did in his translation of the Bible. This explanation would mean that Joseph Smith received the text of our present book of Abraham the same way he received the translation of the parchment of John the Revelator—he did not even need the actual text in front of him.

[Uncle Ted]

Deseret News...

Mormons navigate faith and doubt in the digital age

Two upcoming conferences will explore the uneasy intersection of faith and doubt being carefully traversed by some members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.


The annual conference of the Foundation for Apologetic Information & Research (FAIR) will open Aug. 1 with a presentation by Michael R. Ash on the recently released second edition of his book, "Shaken Faith Syndrome," and will conclude with a panel discussion on "The Loss and Rekindling of Faith." The 2013 Salt Lake Sunstone Symposium begins July 31 and will feature sessions exploring such topics as "Faithful Disagreement: A Model for the Saints."


Many Latter-day Saints, however are finding answers that confirm and renew their faith, according to research conducted by the Pew Research Center’s Forum on Religion & Public Life for its landmark "Mormons in America" study last year. A significant majority — 77 percent — of those who identify themselves as members of the LDS Church "believe wholeheartedly in all the teachings of the church." That number is higher among respondents who have attended college (81 percent), and even higher (85 percent) among those who are college graduates.


Some Latter-day Saints, however — 22 percent in the survey — find that "some teachings of the LDS Church are hard for me to believe." That number declines as individual educational level increases. Only 14 percent of LDS college graduates in the survey expressed such doubts. But anecdotal evidence suggests that other Latter-day Saints have been frustrated because the information and materials they are finding during Internet searches may not square with the things they have learned.


For example, a recent New York Times story focused on Hans H. Mattson, a third-generation Mormon and former bishop, stake president and Area Authority Seventy from Sweden who has been speaking openly, to the Times and elsewhere, about his doubts.


“I felt like I had an earthquake under my feet,” Mattsson told the Times. “Everything I’d been taught, everything I’d been proud to teach and witness just crumbled under my feet.”


Ash, the scholar and author affiliated with FAIR, told the Deseret News he believes "we are seeing a growing problem" in the LDS Church — a problem that has to do with the ready availability of vast resources of information of both the faithful and doubtful varieties.
[...]

http://www.deseretnews.com/article/8...-age.html?pg=1

[Bo Diddley]

Oh, I'm sure you're right. But . . .

https://www.lds.org/ensign/1988/07/i...stion?lang=eng

I'm sure the U&T are still around, because I learned on my mission that the original Ark of the Covenant is in the Salt Lake Temple Holy of Holies, and contains the U&T, the Sword of Laban, the Liahona, and a few other things I can't remember right now. Possibly the gold plates are there.

[SCcoug]

I'm sure the U&T are still around, because I learned on my mission that the original Ark of the Covenant is in the Salt Lake Temple Holy of Holies, and contains the U&T, the Sword of Laban, the Liahona, and a few other things I can't remember right now. Possibly the gold plates are there.

As Uncle Ted has taught those were used to pay for the city creek center.

[Uncle Ted]

As Uncle Ted has taught those were used to pay for the city creek center.

Yes, they were melted down and the gold was sold and used for the seed money for the church's investments. You think tithing was used for city creek center? Besides we didn't need the gold plates any more once the BoM was translated. Come to think of it JS didn't need the gold plates any more once he started using the hat and the stone he found in the well.

[Northwestcoug]

I found a quote from a affable chap that nicely summarizes my own views on this and why I'm not particularly worried about BoA issues:

"I guess I'm not as upset about that kind of thing as I should be since I came to the conclusion a long time ago that, while many people find it helpful to think of LDS theology in a "restorationist" mode, one may also find it useful to see JS as employing the restoration trope as a way of communicating his own insights--revelations, that is--in the only idiom that was available to him in Bible-obsessed Jacksonian America. All religious authority at the time was ultimately derived from ancient scripture and to even get in the game--to even attempt to bring new religious light into the world--meant that you had to do so in the idiom of ancient scripture. We know that God is obliged to speak to us according to the manner of our understanding but we rarely think about the ramifications of this idea. It's unsurprising that JS, showing up on the scene when he did, would consequently see himself first and foremost as a translator of ancient records (why, for instance, couldn't God have simply had Moroni dictate to JS the essence of the BoM? Why did he need an ancient record?). Harrell, if we were to read between the lines of his ostensibly dispassionate book, nevertheless seems to be troubled by this, as many orthodox believers might be. He seems utterly unaware of the significance of the fact that JS might be regarded as recapitulating certain elements of a long-standing tradition of pseudepigraphically generating scripture (which is an ancient tradition indeed). Is the question of Mormon scriptures' ancient origins even relevant? Maybe, maybe not. But I'm at the point where I don't find it a terribly interesting question to ask. We have the fruits of JS's revelations (or, if you prefer, go ahead and put "revelations" in scare quotes--it doesn't matter to me) available for our inspection: we can assess them on their own merits."

p.s. sorry I didn't know how to cut and paste a quote from another thread. My secretary usually does this for me and she's in Wendover this weekend, getting a tattoo retouched.

Look, all of us on this board have to come to a place of comfort concerning their beliefs and behaviors. In the 2 years I've been on this board, I've noticed active members run the gamut, from complete orthodoxy to breaking the WOW to professing atheism. I do not criticize any for doing what gives them peace while staying in the church, not one bit.

But my place of peace can't come from an interpretation of truth and revelation such as yours. I've said before that in the church, history is doctrine, and vice versa. What is the reason for the church's existence, if there wasn't a literal need for a restoration? If the BOM isn't a literal historical document, then what benefit does it hold over other religious texts that have similar good teachings? If I cannot take JS's or any other prophets' words at face value, in a church that demands I believe 100% in its divinity and claims of restoration of the one true church, then why does God expect me to believe in their words and our scripture? And what does that mean, 'believe', in the context of your quoted paragraph? Just a belief that those are the words God wants me to cherish, even though the story (which the church claims is absolutely historically accurate) may not have happened at all?

There is good in the church. There is also good in association with the church, no matter how weak. I do miss some aspects of active participation in the church. But for me, your level of belief doesn't help me stay close to the church. I can't do what it asks me to do, nor can I teach my children what it wants me to, with such a tenuous belief in historical claims. But I sincerely support anybody else who has the same level of belief, and chooses to be more involved than I.

[SoCalCoug]

RT on Kinderhook: "There are two people who said he said something, but the statements are so contradictory, they’re unreliable."
my commentary: This is so misleading, it's hard not to call it a lie. There are several statements from reliable sources that have enough common themes that it's accepted by all serious Mormon scholars.

All in all, just a very interesting meeting if you have any interest in LDS apologetics.

This is one of the biggest problems I'm having with the explanations given by Elders Turley and Jensen at that Swedish meeting. Their explanation on the Kinderhook plates is deceptive.

One person who said something about the Kinderhook Plates was Joseph Smith in History of the Church, volume 5, page 372:

I insert fac-similes of the six brass plates found near Kinderhook, in Pike county, Illinois, on April 23, by Mr. Robert Wiley and others, while excavating a large mound. They found a skeleton about six feet from the surface of the earth, which must have stood nine feet high. The plates were found on the breast of the skeleton and were covered on both sides with ancient characters. I have translated a portion of them, and find they contain the history of the person with whom they were found. He was a descendant of Ham, through the loins of Pharaoh, king of Egypt, and that he received his kingdom from the Ruler of heaven and earth.

I don't know how you can honestly characterize this as contradictory or unreliable. It's a clear statement from Joseph Smith in his official History of the Church, saying, "I have translated a portion of them."

And yet, now people are going to be relying on these misrepresentations to shout down the questioners by saying the statements about the Kinderhook plates are contradictory and unreliable.

[Northwestcoug]

This is one of the biggest problems I'm having with the explanations given by Elders Turley and Jensen at that Swedish meeting. Their explanation on the Kinderhook plates is deceptive.

One person who said something about the Kinderhook Plates was Joseph Smith in History of the Church, volume 5, page 372:



I don't know how you can honestly characterize this as contradictory or unreliable. It's a clear statement from Joseph Smith in his official History of the Church, saying, "I have translated a portion of them."

And yet, now people are going to be relying on these misrepresentations to shout down the questioners by saying the statements about the Kinderhook plates are contradictory and unreliable.

Haven't you heard that William Clayton was JS's scribe? And that he wrote these words down without JS's knowledge?
And that's how you hand-wave away the Kinderhook problem...

[Uncle Ted]

I'm sure the U&T are still around, because I learned on my mission that the original Ark of the Covenant is in the Salt Lake Temple Holy of Holies, and contains the U&T, the Sword of Laban, the Liahona, and a few other things I can't remember right now. Possibly the gold plates are there.

You bet the urim and thummim is still around. Three guys found it in a thrift store and purchased it for 69 cents...

http://www.cougarstadium.com/showthr...l=1#post994073

[CardiacCoug]

Cardiac alluded to this a while ago. When I was in college my faith was fast dissipating and I read an interview with Sterling McMurrin in the Seventh East Press, an on campus publication by BYU students. The interview prompted the school to banish the press, burn it down, scatter the type, etc., in a metaphysical way. Anyway, the interview was wide ranging, very articulate, and fabulous, but McMurren's whole thesis was reducible to essentially, "Look, Book of Mornom anacronysms, the Book of Abraham, Joseph Smith's lechery, etc. didn't affect my faith; I just decided at one point that the world simply doesn't work the way Joseph Smith said it does." That made complete sense to me. In time I also reallzed that this realization is actually what being modern and indeed even being an American is all about.

McMurrin was also concerned about the LDS church's dishonesty. But as he put it, his specific concern was about the way the Church leaders treated members like "babies".

Blake Ostler did the interview. It's on Sunstone or Dialogue's web site.

Man I love that interview. I get a burning in my bosom from those words of Mcmurrin's -- I know they are true without a shadow of a doubt.

[wuapinmon]

Again, I think you misinterpreted Mark's post. It seemed to me that he was trying to understand the mechanisms of the disillusionment process in a sincere manner. Pretty much the opposite spirit of what you are accusing. Dude, this is Mark effing Grace. The nicest guy on CS. You completely whiffed on this one, buddy.

Fine.

[SoonerCoug]

I was just thinking about how much McMurrin sounds like me in that interview--touting his Mormon agnosticism and so forth. Good stuff.

[Harry Tic]

Look, all of us on this board have to come to a place of comfort concerning their beliefs and behaviors. In the 2 years I've been on this board, I've noticed active members run the gamut, from complete orthodoxy to breaking the WOW to professing atheism. I do not criticize any for doing what gives them peace while staying in the church, not one bit.

But my place of peace can't come from an interpretation of truth and revelation such as yours. I've said before that in the church, history is doctrine, and vice versa. What is the reason for the church's existence, if there wasn't a literal need for a restoration? If the BOM isn't a literal historical document, then what benefit does it hold over other religious texts that have similar good teachings? If I cannot take JS's or any other prophets' words at face value, in a church that demands I believe 100% in its divinity and claims of restoration of the one true church, then why does God expect me to believe in their words and our scripture? And what does that mean, 'believe', in the context of your quoted paragraph? Just a belief that those are the words God wants me to cherish, even though the story (which the church claims is absolutely historically accurate) may not have happened at all?

There is good in the church. There is also good in association with the church, no matter how weak. I do miss some aspects of active participation in the church. But for me, your level of belief doesn't help me stay close to the church. I can't do what it asks me to do, nor can I teach my children what it wants me to, with such a tenuous belief in historical claims. But I sincerely support anybody else who has the same level of belief, and chooses to be more involved than I.

I understand and I wouldn't suggest that my kind of reading is necessarily helpful for anyone else. I raise it as a possibility, a way of thinking about the rhetoric of the restoration that we have come to use in the church. My own vantage point is shaped by the premise that it is really, really hard to convey religious (or even "mystical") experience with our ordinary language (While I am not the biggest fan of C.S. Lewis, his essay "Transposition" deals with this issue in an insightful way). Ultimately, I think that the attempt to make any kind of meaningful claim about something inherently beyond language will flounder: "Eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, neither have entered into the heart of man," etc. So, we are forced to use an indirect language of symbols and metaphors. Of course in our age we seem to have a mortal fear of figurative language or anything that doesn't communicate a truth-value in a propositional form. We don't know what to do with it and we inevitably regard it as inferior to straightforward, literal discourse. I don't. (btw, this is probably one of the reasons why people find the temple experience so disconcerting initially: it initiates us into other forms of language use and symbol with which we are totally unfamiliar).

This doesn't mean that belief (or, more accurately, faith) becomes irrelevant. On the contrary, faith means trusting that our inadequate, limited, equivocal ways of speaking about God nevertheless articulate something very real. I see abundant evidence of this in the church.

[jay santos]

One person who said something about the Kinderhook Plates was Joseph Smith in History of the Church, volume 5, page 372:



I don't know how you can honestly characterize this as contradictory or unreliable. It's a clear statement from Joseph Smith in his official History of the Church, saying, "I have translated a portion of them."

And yet, now people are going to be relying on these misrepresentations to shout down the questioners by saying the statements about the Kinderhook plates are contradictory and unreliable.

That was recorded by Willam Clayton. This is a great article on Kinderhook Plates if you haven't read it. http://www.fairlds.org/wp-content/up...-Portion-1.pdf Don Bradley makes what I think is an utterly fascinating discovery in that JS clearly appeared to use his GAEL to start to translate the Kinderhook Plates.

One of the things I love about the field of Mormon Apologetics is that the researchers are still finding little nuggets like this. It's like a Nancy Drew mystery. Another one like this is the recent work on JS source material and Masonic sources, especially George Oliver's Antiquities of Freemasonry.