What's new
By:

Question About Joseph Smith

colton said:
Yes, there are 4 or 5 different accounts that he wrote. I've read them all, and I've also read several accounts by people that related what he told them orally. They all agree in the fundamentals, but disagree on details. For example, in the canonical account (what we have in the Pearl of Great Price) he said that two personages appeared to him, God and Jesus. In some accounts he just said that God appeared to him and didn't mention Jesus. That type of thing doesn't really bother me; if I were to describe an experience that happened to me to different people and at different times I'd probably emphasize different aspects of the experience and maybe get some of the minor details mixed up.



I agree. In fact, I remember reading an interview with one of his neighbors where the lady said something like "He was such a nice, hardworking, honest boy. It's a shame that he went off the deep end." (She didn't that colloquialism but that was the sentiment.) In other words, if he had never had mentioned visions/Book of Mormon/etc., she would have described him as a nice, hardworking, honest boy.
Click to expand...

Yikes.
 
jimmy eat jazz said:
And some of the details they disagree on are pretty significant (e.g., how many personages appeared to him, which strikes me as a difficult detail to forget or on which to get muddled).
Click to expand...

Forgetting and/or getting muddled are of course not the only options here. That's a false dichotomy. There's also the simple possibility of emphasizing different things for different audiences.

I'm curious, if you, or anyone else, sat on a jury and the lead witness for the prosecution in the case changed the details of his/her story repeatedly, even leaving the broad stokes more or less consistent, how credible would you find his witness? Would you vote to convict based on this witness' testimony (all else equal)?
Click to expand...

In this case I find it natural to have slightly different versions when the accounts are related years apart to different audiences under different circumstances. I would find it much more suspicious, actually, if the accounts were all identical.

This is a rather clear cut case in which believers will apply a different, laxer evidentiary standard to their own beliefs than they do to other persons' beliefs, or more generally in other realms of their lives (e.g., how they assess the credibility of someone who repeatedly changes his/her story in other contexts).
Click to expand...

He didn't repeatedly change his story. It's not like he said "Only God showed up. Jesus wasn't there." in one account and "Both God and Jesus were present" in another account.
 
colton said:
For example, in the canonical account (what we have in the Pearl of Great Price) he said that two personages appeared to him, God and Jesus. In some accounts he just said that God appeared to him and didn't mention Jesus.
Click to expand...

Oops, speaking of getting mixed up, I mixed that up. In the one account that he didn't mention both personages, he said that "the Lord" appeared to him, which from the context is apparent he meant Jesus.
 
Dr. Jones said:
Yikes.
Click to expand...

Seriously? Is this because you've read the various accounts and feel the differences are significant? Or is it because you're reading WAY more into what I wrote than I intended?

Tell you what, here's the best site that I know of that compares what he did and didn't say in the various versions: https://www.eldenwatson.net/harmony.htm. If you read through that and still feel that this is a significant issue, then I'll respect your opinion on this matter. As it is, I don't.
 
jimmy eat jazz said:
I'm curious, if you, or anyone else, sat on a jury and the lead witness for the prosecution in the case changed the details of his/her story repeatedly, even leaving the broad stokes more or less consistent, how credible would you find his witness? Would you vote to convict based on this witness' testimony (all else equal)?

This is a rather clear cut case in which believers will apply a different, laxer evidentiary standard to their own beliefs than they do to other persons' beliefs, or more generally in other realms of their lives (e.g., how they assess the credibility of someone who repeatedly changes his/her story in other contexts).

I'd bet my bottom dollar that we won't (as a general but rather consistent rule) find them going to such lengths to rationalize away and excuse other cases in which someone can't get his/her story straight in other contexts and will have difficulty finding this person credible.
Click to expand...

Let me refer you to the same site I just mentioned to PKM Jones: https://www.eldenwatson.net/harmony.htm.

What specifically with regards to the different accounts do you feel would not pass legal muster?
 
colton said:
Seriously? Is this because you've read the various accounts and feel the differences are significant? Or is it because you're reading WAY more into what I wrote than I intended?

Tell you what, here's the best site that I know of that compares what he did and didn't say in the various versions: https://www.eldenwatson.net/harmony.htm. If you read through that and still feel that this is a significant issue, then I'll respect your opinion on this matter. As it is, I don't.
Click to expand...

It was said in jest. I know you didn't mean to imply Jesus is a small detail... just as some know the difference between there and their but get called out anyway. I didn't get th impression that you're too thin-skinned to make that joke. If so; my sincere apologies
 
Dr. Jones said:
It was said in jest. I know you didn't mean to imply Jesus is a small detail... just as some know the difference between there and their but get called out anyway. I didn't get th impression that you're too thin-skinned to make that joke. If so; my sincere apologies
Click to expand...

Oh, sorry, I totally mis-read your post.
 
Dr. Jones said:
1832 version - Jesus Christ
1835 version - a host of angels
1835 version (in same month as above) - host of angels, pillar of fire, angelic being
1838 version (official) - God the Father and Jesus Christ

All religions and denominations have things they have to reconcile. I trouble at times with Jonah, even the ark, timelines... It's about faith not proof.

I pray to not offend but only to encourage a Christain walk that is centered on the simplicity of the love of Christ.
No walls between us as brothers in Him.
Click to expand...
Good thoughts.
 
jimmy eat jazz said:
And some of the details they disagree on are pretty significant (e.g., how many personages appeared to him, which strikes me as a difficult detail to forget or on which to get muddled).

I'm curious, if you, or anyone else, sat on a jury and the lead witness for the prosecution in the case changed the details of his/her story repeatedly, even leaving the broad stokes more or less consistent, how credible would you find his witness? Would you vote to convict based on this witness' testimony (all else equal)?

This is a rather clear cut case in which believers will apply a different, laxer evidentiary standard to their own beliefs than they do to other persons' beliefs, or more generally in other realms of their lives (e.g., how they assess the credibility of someone who repeatedly changes his/her story in other contexts).

I'd bet my bottom dollar that we won't (as a general but rather consistent rule) find them going to such lengths to rationalize away and excuse other cases in which someone can't get his/her story straight in other contexts and will have difficulty finding this person credible.
Click to expand...

So, since this thread seems to have dwindled into a mindless feel-good group hug somehow, I'd like to use your comment to wake someone up. Well, all who like to think, too.

Mormonism is so full of issues like this you just have to give up questioning everything. . . . . hey what about that "Deseret Alphabet" and the Pure Adamic Language and all that? Not as substantial when I bought a text that taught the Egyptian alphabet (phonics and pics are easy to learn), and another book on Egyptian grammar and such, and another book by a kind-hearted Egyptologist who fielded a question from a doubting Mormon about whether there was any hidden or symbolic second meaning in the Egyptian Book of the Dead that could be "translated" into the books in the Pearl of Great Price. . . . The Book of Moses and the Book of Abraham. . . .

Modern LDS apologists like those who write official-looking faithful explanations, which always get changed after the critics tear them apart. . . ., and Colton, will eventually just drop the defense of some items of Mormon faith that just don't have the legs to go any further.

Grouphugs and such, folks. Makes the world a nice place.

Few Mormons ever believed Mormonism for either the Book of Mormon, Joseph Smith, The Pearl of Great Price, or seerstones or alphabets. It's the ideas, folks. The ideas.

There were a lot of thinking Christians in Joseph Smith's days who read the Bible. . . . well, who read it altogether too much. . . . so they noticed some ideas in the Bible that just weren't being preached in the churches of that time. When some missionaries came around giving speeches, generally from Bible references, about how Jesus talked about, and to, His Father, and explained that there really was one person who is the Father, and one person who is the Son, and something else besides called the Holy Ghost, it just made more sense.

And besides, like early Christians, they were a sort of close-knit community of folks who helped one another, and that made it feel good.

Grouphugs, folks. grouphugs.
 
babe said:
So, since this thread seems to have dwindled into a mindless feel-good group hug somehow, I'd like to use your comment to wake someone up. Well, all who like to think, too.

Mormonism is so full of issues like this you just have to give up questioning everything. . . . . hey what about that "Deseret Alphabet" and the Pure Adamic Language and all that? Not as substantial when I bought a text that taught the Egyptian alphabet (phonics and pics are easy to learn), and another book on Egyptian grammar and such, and another book by a kind-hearted Egyptologist who fielded a question from a doubting Mormon about whether there was any hidden or symbolic second meaning in the Egyptian Book of the Dead that could be "translated" into the books in the Pearl of Great Price. . . . The Book of Moses and the Book of Abraham. . . .

Modern LDS apologists like those who write official-looking faithful explanations, which always get changed after the critics tear them apart. . . ., and Colton, will eventually just drop the defense of some items of Mormon faith that just don't have the legs to go any further.

Grouphugs and such, folks. Makes the world a nice place.

Few Mormons ever believed Mormonism for either the Book of Mormon, Joseph Smith, The Pearl of Great Price, or seerstones or alphabets. It's the ideas, folks. The ideas.

There were a lot of thinking Christians in Joseph Smith's days who read the Bible. . . . well, who read it altogether too much. . . . so they noticed some ideas in the Bible that just weren't being preached in the churches of that time. When some missionaries came around giving speeches, generally from Bible references, about how Jesus talked about, and to, His Father, and explained that there really was one person who is the Father, and one person who is the Son, and something else besides called the Holy Ghost, it just made more sense.

And besides, like early Christians, they were a sort of close-knit community of folks who helped one another, and that made it feel good.

Grouphugs, folks. grouphugs.
Click to expand...
I went in for the group hug and someone grabbed my junk. What's up with that?
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Share this page
Back
Top