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curt wrote:Quote:
Old-Timer wrote:
I have no desire to comment it on, curt. All I would have is pure speculation, and anything I say other than, “I think she probably was telling the truth,” would be impugning her character. My own actual answer is, “I think she was telling the truth” – but I have no reason to give for it.
It is absolutely ridiculous to worry about impugning the character of historical figures or else why study history? …So what gives? It is not simply a matter of speculation that the BofM is not true or that the plates really did no exist…Maybe your point is it doesn’t matter because, well, how can we know? But I find that a very weak answer unless one ignores so much of the other evidence demonstrating the falsehood of the plates as an actual physical object that JS had in possession.
I agree that it’s a good idea to question historical claims especially highly unusual claims like this. However, I don’t believe that there is any convincing evidence that there were no plates. Instead we have people saying they saw or touched physical plates so unless there is a good reason to believe they were all liars at the same time then the simplest explanation is that there probably were some plates or at least a physical prop of some sort that they believed to be plates. Basically we don’t really have a single confession by anyone who said they saw or touched the plates later admitting they lied about it just to support Joseph so to assume they were all lying is pure speculation which I think was Ray’s original point.
Besides the official witnesses and Emma another witness of the plates (covered with cloth) was William Smith who said he lifted them and he guessed that they weighed about 60 lbs. When asked if he didn’t want to look under the cloth and see the plates he said no because Joseph told him they would be taken away again and Joseph was really upset when he had lost them before.
Reading some of what David Whitmer said I get the impression that he really believed in the Book of Mormon probably until he died even though he openly disagreed with the LDS Church in Salt Lake and especially disliked the doctrine of polygamy. He seemed to view Joseph Smith as a fallen prophet similar to King David but basically said this was no reason to reject the Book of Mormon because the Lord works in mysterious ways.
I could see a scenario with a few people deliberately telling lies while still being able to keep their stories straight and consistent with each other, but the more people you add to a full-blown conspiracy the harder it is for me to believe that they could really get away with this without at least one of them letting the cat out of the bag at some point. If you assume that the Book of Mormon is a purely man-made myth not only did Joseph Smith and possibly other co-conspirators have to write the story itself but they also had to convince many others to believe in it or get them to go along with them in the scheme without any of them ever exposing it.
curt wrote:
Two of the witnesses did claim that they saw the plates and the angel with their “spiritual eye.”…The witnesses were certainly of questionable mental stability. Or, if that seems to strong a charge, then at least gullibility …As mentioned in an earlier post, Harris changed his religious affiliation numerous times and went on a mission to England for the Strangites, followers of Josiah Strang, who also claimed to have translated ancient documents using the Urim and Thummim. This AFTER his association with JS and the BofM. Not exactly the kind of guy I would want to cite as proof that the BofM is true. Much is true of the other two witnesses (of the main three).
As to why the three did not renounce their testimony, this is not surprising. Having claimed as much, in writing no less, to deny that testimony, which, t cannot be denied, did give them a degree of notoriety, would be akin to admitting to being a liar and a cheat. Plenty of men have gone to their graves without admitting to falsehoods they have created.
The “spiritual eyes” vision and gullibility or mental stability claims don’t really explain the following matter-of-fact non-mystical description made by Emma Smith when answering the questions of her son Joseph Smith III about the plates:
Quote:The plates often lay on the table without any attempt at concealment, wrapped in a small linen tablecloth, which I had given him to fold them in. I once felt of the plates, as they thus lay on the table, tracing their outline and shape. They seemed to be pliable like thick paper, and would rustle with a metallic sound when the edges were moved by the thumb, as one does sometimes thumb the edges of a book.
Another unusual piece of evidence is the Anthon Transcript which has several characters that actually do resemble specific Egyptian characters although some critics see vague similarities to some form of ancient Irish script as well. So if you don’t believe the Church’s official story then it seems like they would probably have had to copy these characters from somewhere and then allow Martin Harris to ask Charles Anthon and others about them.
Making up a huge story is one thing but in this case we have several other people saying that there were metal plates, weird hieroglyphic characters, etc. Without authentic plates, it seems like most of these witnesses would either have to be co-conspirators or deliberately tricked, possibly by seeing and/or touching some fabricated plates or some other prop.
If you really look at some of the details surrounding the Book of Mormon the only explanation I see other than the one given is that it would have to be a truly bold and ambitious hoax executed to perfection. Even the contents of the book are remarkable to think that anyone would go to all this trouble for the sake of spreading a myth or fraud. For example, there are many original names for people and places that are different from those in the Bible or anywhere else that we know about.
curt wrote:One postee wrote that none of the witnesses to plates ever renounced their testimony of their experience, but I am not sure that is true.
Maybe you’re referring to the following comment that I made:
Quote:All it would have taken is for one of these key witnesses to go to the newspapers and deny their testimony to really expose Joseph Smith as an impostor once and for all. Many of them had every reason to do this at different stages in their life and yet none of them did.
I wasn’t trying to claim that this really proves anything by itself. Sure Oliver Cowdery, David Whitmer, and Martin Harris were all excommunicated and had their disagreements with Joseph Smith but as far as I’m concerned that just makes it even more unusual that they didn’t just come right out and publicly deny that they ever saw an angel or the gold plates if they didn’t really believe this. The closest thing to any denial that I know about are some reports that some of them later said this was more of a vision seen with “spiritual eyes” rather than a physical experience.
My main point was that the involvement of these other witnesses of the plates makes it harder to try to claim that Joseph Smith was simply delusional, misinterpreting some experiences like temporal lobe epilepsy, or writing inspired fiction through automatic writing or some other form of channeling, etc. The fact that so many witnesses mentioned seeing and/or touching the plates and consistently stood by this testimony makes me think that the most likely naturalistic explanation for the Book of Mormon would have to be some level of conscious fraud and probably a full-blown conspiracy involving at least Oliver Cowdery as well.
Maybe Joseph Smith really believed that the Native Americans were descended from Israelites and that they should have had their own prophets but that the details of telling this story were secondary. Maybe he really thought he was inspired and called by God to restore the true Christian church but that making up a few stories about angels and buried plates was justified if it would help him build up his vision of the kingdom of God. The idea behind this alleged motive is that some people think that telling “pious” lies is not that bad if they produce desirable results in the end and they will do whatever it takes to convince people to agree with them.
There are many apocryphal religious books that look like people simply came along and wrote their own ideas but claimed that it was actually Moses, Enoch, some Apostle, etc. that wrote it. It’s almost like they thought this is what these men should have said if they had time and I guess they thought it would sound better if people believed it was some ancient prophet saying it instead of them. So maybe Joseph Smith did the same kind of thing in part because he thought it would help him improve on the existing religions of the time.
Brian Johnston wrote:The biggest problems with the Rigdon-Spaulding theory are very hard to work around
…The time line doesn’t work, and it would require an amazingly cool and calculating Sidney Rigdon that stretches belief in normal human nature.
That’s why I like the Spalding-Rigdon authorship conspiracy theory so much, because it doesn’t really make that much sense but some people still believe in it anyway. It’s a persistent rumor that just won’t go away. Just when I think I’ve read everything there is to know about this theory something else turns up like the Stanford wordprint study.
The involvement of the official witnesses, Emma, etc. complicates almost any Book of Mormon authorship theory other than that everything happened almost exactly the way they said it did. Like Bruce pointed out, if Joseph Smith simply had temporal lobe epilepsy then how did he get Oliver Cowdery to share/support some of his most important experiences and claims?
All it would have taken is for one of these key witnesses to go to the newspapers and deny their testimony to really expose Joseph Smith as an impostor once and for all. Many of them had every reason to do this at different stages in their life and yet none of them did. Meanwhile other ex-Mormons such as Ezra Booth did publicly oppose Mormonism but as it turns out none of them were listed as direct witnesses of the gold plates or Book of Mormon translation process.
Euhemerus wrote:Here are some additional questions that arise for me:
1. What about Muhammed? Do you feel a need to account for the origin of the Quran? It is not obvious to me that the origins of that book are significantly different than the BoM or D&C (especially if one takes the “channeled” approach as has been described here). I see little reason to believe in the divinity of the BoM and not the Quran. Having said that, I think the Quran contains a lot of “inspired” things. I just finished reading a biography of Muhammed and I was blown away at the similarities to Joseph and the early church.
…if ever there was a case for a prophet, he makes a very strong on. But then again, so does Muhammed.
I read an article somewhere comparing the claimed transcendent experiences of the Apostle Paul, Muhammad, and Joseph Smith. The author who researched these cases believed Muhammad had genuine supernatural experiences in part because of “numerology” in the Quran that was supposedly unlikely to occur by chance and hard to fake. He came to the conclusion that Muhammad’s experience probably involved a demon of some sort and that Joseph Smith was probably just a “pious” fraud in his opinion but he believed Paul’s experience was authentically inspired by God.
In fact, I have seen many traditional Christians make similar claims about Joseph Smith and Muhammad that they had to be liars, crazy, and/or demon-possessed but maybe this just shows their bias in terms of what they want to believe. Personally, I don’t know what to think about Muhammad but we have seen people make all kinds of crazy claims throughout history. If many people believe in something that turns out to be nonsense mostly based on what other people have told them it wouldn’t be the first time and probably won’t be the last.
curt wrote:…what are the prevailing arguments about how Joseph Smith could have been the author of the book? … We know he was fairly illiterate. Emma said there was no way JS was capable of penning the BofM because he was simply too illiterate… how does one explain how JS wrote the BofM if, in fact, it was NOT through divine intervention?
My favorite conspiracy theory about the Book of Mormon is that Sidney Rigdon modified a manuscript he stole from Solomon Spalding that supposedly specifically mentioned Nephi, Lehi, Moroni, and Lamenites according to some signed affidavits. One problem with this theory is that this particular manuscript has never been found and an existing Solomon Spalding manuscript that was found and published actually bears little resemblance to the Book of Mormon. Another problem is that Sidney Rigdon consistently claimed that he didn’t know anything about the Book of Mormon until he received a copy from Parley P. Pratt. Although this theory sounds like it is mostly based on rumors and speculation rather than credible evidence, some researchers at Stanford University actually did a computer wordprint study that they claim supports the Spalding-Rigdon authorship idea.
Personally, I don’t believe Joseph Smith could have just made it all up on the fly while looking at a peep stone in a hat but I do believe he could have easily memorized the story and dictated it regardless of who actually wrote it. Another theory is that maybe Joseph Smith was crazy to the point that he actually believed his own delusions. In this case he could have easily told a story that would sound very different from his own writings. My point is that trying to claim that it is impossible that Joseph Smith could produce the Book of Mormon without supernatural assistance is simply not true because if you use your imagination or look at some existing theories there are definitely other possible explanations that are at least plausible. It’s a question of faith not proof.
Brian Johnston wrote:I agree with you DevilsAdvocate. I think we could really do a lot more good in the world, influence MORE people towards a life of divine transformation if the active, traditional core of the Church was more comfortable sitting on the pew next to someone who smells like smoke or drinks a beer now and then.
The problem is we ask new converts to basically be temple worthy (which should be the pinnacle of our ideas of righteousness) when they take the first steps into the religion/culture — baptism. We also have a bad habit of indirectly chasing away people who are already members with those same inclinations.
These kinds of temple worthiness requirements are emphasized so much in the Church that for many members this is what being a Mormon is all about basically things like not drinking coffee, paying tithing, etc. I think this is actually the real root of the problem many people have with the Church. The church makes so many demands of members in terms of time, money, and strict rules like this that some people will start to ask why exactly do I need to do all this? Is it really worth it?
The Church will insist that it is definitely worth it because this is the only way to have an eternal family in the Celestial Kingdom and we know all this because the prophets said so. The problem is that some people will then start to question just how much we can really trust these prophets. If it wasn’t for all the demands the Church currently makes many ex-Mormons probably wouldn’t have cared quite so much whether Joseph Smith’s claims are 100% true or not but as it is there is an obvious motive for some people to look for excuses to leave. At the same time the Church almost needs Joseph Smith to be everything they claim he was in order to really justify some of the demands they make. It’s become a bit of a catch-22.
Personally, I think we should try to move in the direction of being a kinder and gentler church and less of a burden even if that means fewer members going to the temple if they aren’t really comfortable with some of the entrance requirements. The Church leaders might be overestimating the strength of their position at this point. Telling people they need to do this or believe this because the prophets said so probably doesn’t carry quite the same weight that it used to. With all the anti-Mormon propaganda on the internet and more atheists actively trying to convert people nowadays some members’ faith will already be tested to the limit. Making too many demands just because that’s what we have always done will probably push more people over the edge now than in the past. Considering what exactly our goals are here and what they should be is something to think about.
Heber13 wrote:…Likewise, I see no reason the church would change it. Could it change? Sure, because I think energy drinks are worse than tea, in my irrelevant opinion.
Someone needs to think of a good argument why it should be changed, otherwise, it has become a cultural thing and is not a bad thing, so why fix something that ain’t broke.
…Word of Wisdom…I see no argument that alcohol, tea, coffee and tobacco can not be a token requirement to sacrafice for one’s faith in the Lord. Why must people
notbe told to abstain from these things? I see no argument to change it, despite having no testimony for requiring it. For me, it is way down on the totem pole of things that should be changed in the church. I don’t really expect the official Word of Wisdom policies to change any time soon simply because so many active members have gotten used to it to the point that we often think this is just the way it is supposed to be. I think the Church has typically liked and encouraged the idea of members being different and separate from “the world.” To change at this point would ruffle some feathers because some members would see this as lowering our standards.
That said, I think there are actually some good reasons to at least consider softening our emphasis on the Word of Wisdom somewhat. My guess is that this could actually turn out to be the single biggest issue that limits the sustained growth of the church, the long-term retention of members, and the activity levels of existing members.
For example, many youth who are raised in the Church or converts who are just getting started in the Church will quickly learn how much many active members frown on these habits. If members like this have already tried some of these things and then decide that they don’t really want to stop drinking or smoking or if they try to stop and fail some of them will just avoid the Church as much as possible because they feel uncomfortable around other members and want to avoid a guilt trip. If some members start to associate the Church mostly with strict rules, guilt, and shame then it becomes a negative experience for them and many will never come back because they think it’s just not worth it.
Even for the active members I worry that such a strong emphasis on the letter-of-the-law can easily lead to judgmental, self-righteous, and elitist attitudes that are polarizing and unchristian in nature (Matthew 9:10-12). I’m not so sure that it helps our credibility with the outside world to insist that drinking a cup of coffee is a sin that God is going to condemn people for. When some people hear about this it simply doesn’t make any sense to them and they might even start to think of us as fanatics because of a few things like this.
I have even heard members claim that positive references to wine in the Bible are actually talking about grape juice. Where did this idea come from? Seriously, there was no refrigeration back then so it’s not like they could just keep a fresh supply of grape juice on hand. Until recently beer and wine were actually safer to drink than the water in many cases and it might still be that way in some locations. Nutritional experts are constantly saying how drinking moderate amounts of wine is actually good for you in many ways.
Personally, I think we have gone way overboard with some of these attitudes. Whatever happened to common sense? Just because someone drinks a few beers it doesn’t mean he’s a bad guy in general or that he is going to die young. It seems like we could teach these principles as more of a suggestion similar to the RLDS (Community of Christ) Church rather than a set-in-stone commandment. We could still openly condemn alcohol abuse and other unhealthy addictions without alienating some Church members who struggle with these habits quite as much as we do now. Basically, I think it would be better to reach out to people and try to make them feel loved rather than treat them as if they are a lost cause and they’ve failed the test.
MWallace57 wrote:One thing I know is that science requires that we be willing to CHANGE our beliefs. One must be ever ready to “unlearn” old truths and relearn truth to a newer, fuller understanding. This is growth.
…I’m not a prophet, I don’t lead the Church, but science has changed the world so much. “Switch the emphasis from baptism for the dead to healing and curing the living”. We are so blessed to live in a day and age when we can actually do this. The idea sounded amazing to me, but, can the church actually change?
Yes the Church can change and it has already changed many times throughout its history but they do seem to lag behind current trends and resist popular opinions to some extent. For example, denying blacks the priesthood was taught as doctrine before but this was eventually reversed completely.
Old-Timer wrote:Devil’s Advocate, another very sincere question:
Quote:What do you want from this forum?
I ask that simply because I think we all pretty much agree completely with most of what you just wrote – most of it at least at some level. However, in the context of this forum, what are you looking to get out of your participation?
Again, please understand, I’m not asking for ANY reason other than to encourage introspection and focus. Nobody here advocates the extremes you address…
I mostly just wanted to vent my frustration about the current culture, policies, and direction of the Church which I don’t believe are sustainable over the long run. I would hate to see the Church go away entirely but without some positive changes I really think there will be a significant decline over the next few decades. Maybe some decline is inevitable if the Church really depends on everyone believing Joseph Smith’s claims as much as they seem to think but personally I think the people and their sincere faith in God is what makes the Church special more than any specific beliefs.
Euhemerus wrote:DevilsAdvocate wrote:To me the Church should ideally be about Christian fellowship first and foremost more than insisting on the acceptance of certain doctrines and telling people what to do in great detail. Sure they have backed off on the idea of young earth creationism, a global flood, etc. since the heyday of Joseph Fielding Smith and Bruce R. McConkie and they’ve backed off on other things like birth control whenever convenient.
Yes, ideally, this would be great. Unfortunately churches that are just about Christian fellowship, and have no mechanisms that keep an organization strong usually fade out, or are weak by comparison. If you know of a strong church, that has as good of a community feeling (as Mormonism), that is only about Christian fellowship, please let us all know!!.One example of a church that seems to have less of an emphasis on doctrine and strict rules at least from the average follower’s perspective is actually the biggest church of all with over a billion Catholics worldwide. Maybe overall strength is relative because many Catholics probably can’t be expected to have the same level of commitment as the average practicing Mormon. However, I’m not so sure that this is such a bad thing in general over the long run. Personally, I think this is one reason the Catholic Church isn’t going away any time soon. It means different things to different people. If some Catholics feel more zealous about religion than others then they can express this without making it an expected requirement for everyone.
Look at the results, some of the negative history surrounding the Catholic Church is no secret but many Catholics aren’t bothered by this to the point that they will ever leave. The Pope can say something stupid and many Catholics couldn’t care less. One reason they stay in spite of any negatives is that they have realistic expectations because they realize that it is essentially a human organization so they don’t really expect it to be perfect and many of them don’t expect the Bible to be perfect either the way many Protestant/Evangelical Christians do.
Now I’m not saying the LDS Church should try to emulate the Catholic Church in general but I do think we could get to the point where we can talk about Joseph Smith and his teachings and revelations without thinking it needs to be a dealbreaker if someone isn’t convinced that this is the complete truth. We can still love our neighbors and make them feel welcome at church without so much concern about whether they believe exactly the same things that we do.
In some cases the LDS Church already looks similar the Catholic Church albeit the medieval version back when they had the political power to enforce their beliefs without much opposition. Seriously, D. Michael Quinn, Grant Palmer, and Simon Southerton were excommunicated or dis-fellowshipped mostly because they didn’t whitewash their research conclusions and align their opinions with the official position of the Church. If this is not reactionary disrespect for honest scholarship and intellectual freedom then I don’t know what is. Maybe this kind of hard-line policy will work to retain some TBMs because they will shun any known apostates and refuse to listen to them but the flip-side is that this kind of reaction gives the impression that the Church is trying to hide something or cover-up the truth. This can make curious members want to uncover any dirt even more and once they do there is no going back for many of them.
Old-Timer wrote:Questions for internal contemplation, that I believe you are going to have to consider if you are going to find peace and joy within the LDS Church:
1) Why do you need to read between the lines?
I’m just trying to understand what they are thinking and what these statements really mean if taken to their logical conclusion. I’m really not trying to be as cynical as I probably sound here. I’m sure most of these Church leaders are nice guys that are trying to do what they think is right under the circumstances. However, I worry that some of them are out of touch with a significant number of members who basically look at the Church as more of a social club and/or family tradition rather than the ultimate source of truth and spiritual guidance. These leaders treat the Church like it’s a package deal as if any lukewarm “cafeteria” Mormons should just get with the program or get out. This looks like conditional love which doesn’t really inspire trust and loyalty.
Old-Timer wrote:2) Are you open to an attempt to discover something else (a different reconciliation strategy) – or, at the very least, that such a strategy as you suggest is not good for the vast majority of people in ANY organization, including yourself?
I’m open to any strategy that works in practice. However, I just don’t agree the with the whole one-size-fits-all idea that says if I have a problem with the Church then the problem must automatically be with me. If the current policies and hard-line doctrines of the Church are really working all that well then I don’t understand why more than 99% of the people in the world are not LDS and something like two-thirds of the members they still count are not currently active. Growth of the Church has really stalled in recent years with new converts barely making up for the losses.
I understand that the Church wants members to do what is right rather than whatever is easy or convenient but come on. There are other churches out there that are just as strict or more so than the LDS Church that sill retain their followers better than we have lately. Just because certain policies used to work alright 15 years ago doesn’t mean they are the best thing to do right now or for the future of the Church.
Old-Timer wrote:3) Do you really think that ignoring what leaders say and telling other leaders that they also need to ignore those leaders is a “reconciliation strategy”? It seems more like an “I’m right and you need to agree with me” strategy – that it’s a reconciliation of others “to” YOU, not a reconciliation of you “with” the group.
I’m not suggesting that members should ignore the prophets and apostles entirely; I just think that it’s a good idea to take some of what they say with a grain of salt. For example, Gordon B. Hinckley once stressed that women should not wear more than one pair of “modest” earrings. Many Mormons will take this kind of thing very seriously as if it came directly from God but to me this honestly sounds more like something you would hear out of the Pharisees than from Jesus.
I wasn’t trying to say that members should tell other leaders to ignore the prophets and apostles. What I meant was that if you’re having a hard time because you feel the Church is making unreasonable demands and/or you don’t have a lot of confidence that they know what they are talking about then you could share some of these concerns with your bishop rather than just leaving the Church behind without looking back. I’m guessing that this is the main reason that they stopped condemning birth control the way they used to, because too many members didn’t follow this advice anyway and complained about it.
Brian Johnston wrote:I’m not sure what your point is DevilsAdvocate. If you are trying to let us know that a leader in the Church might say something incorrect, or that you don’t believe them, that isn’t newsworthy here. We get it. That’s why we are here.
You have to post something about a reconciliation strategy or a solution to the problem.
It’s not a matter of whether I believe them or not the thing that bothers me is that they try to tie membership in the Church to the expectation that we should just believe them without questioning their authority or accuracy. If the prophets say the scientists are wrong then they must be wrong and anyone who thinks otherwise is on the road to apostasy according to TBMs. That’s my main point. Look at this part of the Monson quote again:
Quote:
“I propose to stay with my faith, with the faith of my people. I know that happiness and contentment are there”
Then there is this quote from Gordon B. Hinckley:
Quote:
“Each of us has to face the matter-either the Church is true, or it is a fraud. There is no middle ground. It is the Church and kingdom of God, or it is nothing.”
Reading between the lines the idea seems to be that if you don’t believe in the major claims of the Church then you might as well just leave it behind. Never mind the sense of community and promoting Christian values and any good the Church does for people, if Joseph Smith lied then we might as well just forget about it according to this line of reasoning.
For many members leaving can be a painful thing to even consider and it’s not that easy to just walk away. So what will help ease the pain? If you ask them the answer is that you just need to try harder to believe and fall in line with the accepted doctrines and ignore the questions and “little flicks” of history.
To me the Church should ideally be about Christian fellowship first and foremost more than insisting on the acceptance of certain doctrines and telling people what to do in great detail. Sure they have backed off on the idea of young earth creationism, a global flood, etc. since the heyday of Joseph Fielding Smith and Bruce R. McConkie and they’ve backed off on other things like birth control whenever convenient. However, it’s no surprise that they still insist that we should pay them a full 10% of our income so we can be blessed and have an eternal family. Now if I don’t do what they say in a case like this it doesn’t just affect me it upsets my family like I’m letting them down.
The only reconciliation strategy I see is for more members to stop listening to them when they say something questionable and maybe talk to their bishop or stake president and hope some of it reaches the top.
Cadence wrote:I have always been intrigued by NDE’s, but like other events they cannot prove the existence of an afterlife. The non believer would say it is just the way the brain works to cope with traumatic situation …
Like small miracles that happen they seem to be of most benefit to the person who experiences them.
Several accounts of out-of-body experiences and ghost stories involving people I know personally are one of the main reasons that I’ll never be an atheist. If I had to depend on the Bible or Church alone to support my faith I don’t think I could have done it for this long but these stories gave me a lot more hope beyond basic wishful thinking that spirits can really exist without a physical body.
Personally, I just don’t believe that atheist explanations can really account for every experience like this. For example, they will try to claim that this is merely some natural process in the sub-conscious mind similar to a simple dream but this explanation doesn’t really match some of the stories I have heard very well.
In cases like this, it looks to me like most skeptics typically just start out with the answer they expect to find and then try to confirm their bias rather than just following the evidence wherever it leads with an open mind. In fact many skeptics don’t even take experiences like this seriously enough to even investigate any of them in detail. It’s almost like they don’t even dare to consider the possibility of spirits because then they’ll have to turn in their science card.
Old-Timer wrote:…what you describe in your last paragraph is NOT the stance of the LDS Church. It isn’t even the belief paradigm of a large percentage of the membership, and it certainly doesn’t match what Joseph said about himself. Also, I don’t know of a single apostle in the history of the Church who said or who would say that Joseph was infallible and that every word that came from his mouth was God’s perfect word.
…We simply can’t argue for or against strawmen on this site, since it just isn’t productive for our own growth or the edification of the community.
I exaggerated this point, what I meant to say is that the idea is that the revealed word of God (scriptures) given to us by prophets should be trusted as literally true without fail. The assumption is that these words came directly from God so they must be right and because of this these revelations should basically trump or supersede other sources of knowledge. Whether this is an official policy or not this is the impression I always got.
I understand the idea that prophets or apostles are not perfect and can make mistakes and still have their own personal opinions and this all makes sense. When anti-Mormons bring up some obscure quotes from the “Journal of Discourses” or some hearsay about Joseph Smith it never bothered me nearly as much as something that doesn’t make sense in the standard works. I guess you can always interpret things differently and maybe God allows some confusion and uncertainty just to test people’s faith but sometimes it’s hard to believe that some of this came from God.
