LDS II: The Mormons

[skyrider44]

Why would the government send people out to tell me there were horses in the pre Columbian Americas?

You are unaware, apparently, that many churches sponsor humanitarian, non-sacramental, non-doctrinal services for people in need. Actually, I'm certain you are aware of that; you simply couldn't resist the opportunity to take a cheap shot.

 

[skyrider44]

You did make a claim about Hebrew idioms up thread. How about you just offer evidence for what you claimed? It was your claim, it hardly seems like a lot to ask for you to substantiate it.

Refer to my post of today, 3:46 p.m.

 

[skyrider44]

Governments at all levels already perform social safety network functions. I see religious organizations only working at the margins and some use their work as an opportunity to proselytize. I could be wrong though. All you need do is provide some evidence for the highlighted word.

Wait! I asked you for some evidence? Silly me.

The American Association of Fund-Raising Counsel (title may vary slightly) annually publishes a report of charitable giving in the U.S. You can find the most recent report online, and it will prove to you what I have stated about the role of churches and other non-profits in providing humanitarian services to the needy. In fact, a principle reason Congress created 501(c)(3) status was to give an incentive for people to contribute to charities and receive a charitable contribution deduction, thus partly relieving government of some social service needs.

 

[Giordano]

Remember the old adage "It's a good idea to be careful what you ask for"?

In the Journal of Book of Mormon Studies, 4/1 (1995), pp. 218-25, Sidney B. Sperry published an article entitled "Hebrew Idioms in the Book of Mormon." Here are some excerpts:

1) "Literal translations of Hebrew idioms are prevalent in the Book of Mormon, as are literal renditions of compound Hebrew prepositions."

2) "The use of bdyadh 'by the hand of,' indicating agency or instrumentality, occurs 47 times in the Nephite record."

3) "The compound preposition mippdne, 'from' (literally 'from before') . . . very often receives a literal translation in the BoM. Examples:
'And they fled from before my presence.' (1 Nephi 4:28) . . . 'For he had gone from before my presence.'" (1 Nephi 11:12) . . .'Insomuch that they did fall back from before them.'" (3 Nephi 4:12)

4) "Another similar compound, mippi, 'from the mouth of,' will be found in the Book of Mormon six times, [including in 1 Nephi 13:24 and Mosiah 21:28]."

Dr. Sperry cites many other examples and concludes: "These studies support the idea that the Book of Mormon was originally written in Hebrew. Most of the idioms in the book appear to be typically Hebrew; there appear to be few which could be called Egyptian. To be sure Egyptian names are found in the Nephite record, and other evidences point to the fact that Nephite historians were acquainted with the language and customs of Egypt, but the text proper shows the strong influence of Hebrew."

Of course, the naysayers will say that Joseph Smith merely copied the Hebrew idioms from the Bible. That may be, but it is not fair to say that Hebrew idioms are not evident in the Book of Mormon.

I believe the Church of LDS's claim is that Smith used translations of the Hebrew idioms that would only be available to him by divine insight. If he could have gotten these from the Bible, or any book available to him at the time, then any suggestion that his use of these idioms is somehow magical and thus helps establish the divinity of the BofM completely disappears.

 

[Pixel42]

Personally I'd rather pay higher taxes than live in a society where those in need are dependant on charity.

 

[skyrider44]

. . . Let's start with some expressions by those who felt oppressed:

There's also Young's infamous quote:
"Shall I tell you the law of God in regard to the African race? If the white man who belongs to the chosen seed mixes his blood with the seed of Cain, the penalty, under the law of God, is death on the spot. This will always be so."
Journal of Discourses vol 10 p.110

Clearly this is not the LDS position today, but my claim was that regarding the LDS history.
Your claim was that all oppressive positions were simply unintentional.

You inserted "all" presumably to gain some argumentative advantage, thus you distorted my position. Hmmm . . . why does the word "dishonesty" come to mind?

In the text that follows you use two or three examples to illustrate what you believe is truth of universal applicability, which is a gross error in trying to make a point inductively.

Then there's the oppression of same-sex individuals.
In this regard, I need not even cite (which is easy to do: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Homosexuality_and_The_Church_of_Jesus_Christ_of_Latter-day_Saints), for all I have need to do is point that my own MOTHER is one who altered her outward sexual preference just to fit in with the LDS paradigm she was pressured to fit in with.

She wanted acceptance and there was no acceptance for her same-sex biological want.
In response, she elected to marry an ultra-conservative LDS man and suddenly play the role (abnormally) of heterosexual ultra-conservative LDS wife.

Not intentionally oppressive?
Exactly how is the massive pressure against homosexuality not intentionally oppressive?

There's also the oppression of the genders in that I have personally spoken to women who have left the LDS faith because they are worn out from the chauvinistic bias built into the paradigm of the community - equally frustrated women are battling currently for the right to be part of the priesthood, which is currently not permitted.

We can continue to proceed in like fashion, but the point is that they are passively bias and oppressive with quite the overt intention, and this is saying nothing at all about support and propositions within government legislation (as others have also mentioned).

 

[Giordano]

The American Association of Fund-Raising Counsel (title may vary slightly) annually publishes a report of charitable giving in the U.S. You can find the most recent report online, and it will prove to you what I have stated about the role of churches and other non-profits in providing humanitarian services to the needy. In fact, a principle reason Congress created 501(c)(3) status was to give an incentive for people to contribute to charities and receive a charitable contribution deduction, thus partly relieving government of some social service needs.

I am sorry, but after going to that website I found it vary confusing as to how to find this list, and specifically, the extent of the role of the Church of LDS in this. Do you have a more specific links? Thanks.

 

[Giordano]

You inserted "all" presumably to gain some argumentative advantage, thus you distorted my position. Hmmm . . . why does the word "dishonesty" come to mind?

In the text that follows you use two or three examples to illustrate what you believe is truth of universal applicability, which is a gross error in trying to make a point inductively.

You repeatedly asked us how the Church of LDS has had a negative impact on the posters here. Wasn't your position that the Church has had no intentional negative impact (i.e. in NO case) or did you already know of some of these intentional negative impacts and were only asking us if we knew of them and if they affected us? It certainly appeared to me that you implying that ALL actions of the Church had no intended negative consequences; if so, even one example would contradict such a statement.

 

[JaysonR]

Thank you for providing the Hebrew Idiom citations.
I will now review these three citations:

2) "The use of bdyadh 'by the hand of,' indicating agency or instrumentality, occurs 47 times in the Nephite record."

This phrase occurs 74 times in the King James Version of the Christian Bible:
Genesis 38:20
Genesis 49:24
Exodus 4:13
Exodus 16:3
Exodus 35:29
Exodus 38:21
Leviticus 8:36
Leviticus 10:11
Leviticus 16:21
Leviticus 26:46
Numbers 4:37
Numbers 4:45
Numbers 4:49
Numbers 9:23
Numbers 10:13
Numbers 15:23
Numbers 16:40
Numbers 27:23
Numbers 36:13
Joshua 14:2
Joshua 20:2
Joshua 20:9
Joshua 21:2
Joshua 21:8
Joshua 22:9
Judges 3:4
1 Samuel 11:7
1 Samuel 18:25
1 Samuel 27:1
2 Samuel 3:18
2 Samuel 10:2
2 Samuel 11:14
2 Samuel 12:25
2 Samuel 21:22
1 Kings 2:25
1 Kings 8:53
1 Kings 8:56
1 Kings 14:18
1 Kings 16:7
2 Kings 14:25
2 Kings 14:27
1 Chronicles 6:15
1 Chronicles 20:8
1 Chronicles 29:5
1 Chronicles 29:8
2 Chronicles 8:18
2 Chronicles 10:15
2 Chronicles 12:7
2 Chronicles 23:18
2 Chronicles 24:11
2 Chronicles 26:11
2 Chronicles 33:8
2 Chronicles 35:6
Ezra 1:8
Ezra 8:33
Nehemiah 9:14
Job 27:11
Psalm 77:20
Proverbs 26:6
Isaiah 51:18
Jeremiah 19:7
Jeremiah 27:3
Jeremiah 29:3
Jeremiah 38:23
Ezekiel 25:14
Ezekiel 28:10
Ezekiel 30:10
Ezekiel 30:12
Acts 5:12
Acts 7:35
Acts 11:30
Acts 19:11
Acts 22:11
Colossians 4:18

3) "The compound preposition mippdne, 'from' (literally 'from before') . . . very often receives a literal translation in the BoM. Examples:
'And they fled from before my presence.' (1 Nephi 4:28) . . . 'For he had gone from before my presence.'" (1 Nephi 11:12) . . .'Insomuch that they did fall back from before them.'" (3 Nephi 4:12)

This phrase occurs 26 times in the King James Version of the Christian Bible:
Genesis 23:3
Genesis 43:34
Genesis 47:10
Exodus 4:3
Exodus 13:22
Exodus 14:19
Exodus 23:28
Exodus 23:29
Exodus 23:30
Leviticus 9:24
Leviticus 10:4
Numbers 17:9
Numbers 20:9
Numbers 32:21
Numbers 33:8
Numbers 33:52
Numbers 33:55
Deuteronomy 2:12
Deuteronomy 2:22
Deuteronomy 4:38
Deuteronomy 6:19
Deuteronomy 9:4
Deuteronomy 9:5
Deuteronomy 11:23
Deuteronomy 12:29

4) "Another similar compound, mippi, 'from the mouth of,' will be found in the Book of Mormon six times, [including in 1 Nephi 13:24 and Mosiah 21:28]."

This phrase occurs 4 times in the King James Version of the Christian Bible:
2 Chronicles 35:22
2 Chronicles 36:12
Jeremiah 36:4
Jeremiah 36:32




Summary:
None of the cited idioms are unique to the Book of Mormon and incapable of being copied from the King James Version of the Bible - in fact, it is more likely that they were copied from the King James Version of the Bible as the idioms are very like near copies of sections in the King James in some cases.

For example: Nephi 13:24
"And the angel of the Lord said unto me: Thou hast beheld that the book proceeded forth from the mouth of a Jew; and when it proceeded forth from the mouth of a Jew ..."

Jeremiah 36:4 KJV
"Then Jeremiah called Baruch the son of Neriah: and Baruch wrote from the mouth of Jeremiah all the words of the Lord, which he had spoken unto him, upon a roll of a book."


If that is not close enough, there are more exact copies of the phrases such as 1 Nephi 4:28 and Joshua 10:11 as found in the KJV.

Here, you have:
1 Nephi 4:28
"And it came to pass that when Laman saw me he was exceedingly frightened, and also Lemuel and Sam. And they fled from before my presence; for they supposed it was Laban, and that he had slain me and had sought to take away their lives also."

Joshua 10:11 KJV
"And it came to pass, as they fled from before Israel, and were in the going down to Bethhoron, that the Lord cast down great stones from heaven upon them unto Azekah, and they died: they were more which died with hailstones than they whom the children of Israel slew with the sword."

Now, for comparison; let us take a look at how the actual literal translation of Joshua in the Hebrew is rendered when not translated into King James English.

וַיְהִי בְּנֻסָם מִפְּנֵי יִשְׂרָאֵל, הֵם בְּמוֹרַד בֵּית-חוֹרֹן וַיהוָה הִשְׁלִיךְ עֲלֵיהֶם אֲבָנִים גְּדֹלוֹת מִן-הַשָּׁמַיִם עַד-עֲזֵקָה--וַיָּמֻתוּ: רַבִּים, אֲשֶׁר-מֵתוּ בְּאַבְנֵי הַבָּרָד, מֵאֲשֶׁר הָרְגוּ בְּנֵי יִשְׂרָאֵל, בֶּחָרֶב.

Reversing the order into English alignment from left to right instead of right to left (as the above is presented) the exactly "literal" phrases are:

and·he-is-becoming in·to-flee-of·them from·faces-of Israel they in·descent-of Beth-Horon and·Yahweh he-flung on·them stones great-ones from the·heavens as-far-as Azekah and·they-are-dying many-ones who they-died in·stones-of the·hail from·whom they-killed sons-of Israel in·the·sword.


So the "literal" ("Literal translations of Hebrew idioms...") Hebrew Idioms are not translated at all.
The "literal" would be "in to flee of them from the face of"; at the very least, it would be something along the lines of "they fled from my face" or "they fled from the face of myself" - at the very least.


The King James has "from before" because it is an English translation OF the Septuagint, and Latin Vulgate as they desired.

For example, if you flip to the Setuagint section of Joshua, you won't find "from before".
ἐν τῷ δὲ φεύγειν αὐτοὺς ἀπὸ προσώπου τῶν υἱῶν Ισραηλ

Which is using προσώπου, as the Hebrew does. This means "face".

There is no, "from before" in either the Hebrew or Septuagint; that is not the literal Hebrew idiom.
The Hebrew idiom is to refer to the face as that which another leaves, for it is with the face that witness is held, and it is the face in which one can judge.
To remove one's self from the face of another is to hide in shame.
Simplifying the phrase to "from before" does not accurately convey the Hebrew cultural connotation of the idiom.

This is a unique flaw in the rendering of the King James Bible and does not appear in prior Masoretic or Septuagint copies of the Hebrew Bible where employing the same Hebrew idiom.

 

[Pup]

Of course, the naysayers will say that Joseph Smith merely copied the Hebrew idioms from the Bible. That may be, but it is not fair to say that Hebrew idioms are not evident in the Book of Mormon.

Linguistics is not my field at all, but it's my understanding the argument goes like this:

1) If Smith had no way of knowing about these unique Hebrew idioms other than divine inspiration, they're evidence that the Book of Mormon was divinely inspired.

2) If Smith could have picked up these unique Hebrew idioms by basing his language on the KJV of the Bible, they might be expected but they're not evidence that his translation was divinely inspired.

So there's not really any option for "nay-saying." On the issue of whether the Book of Mormon was divinely inspired, it's a simple logic question. In this case, the answer is that the Hebrew phrases offer no evidence of divine inspiration, because they have a possible mundane origin*.

On other unrelated issues, like how "reformed Egyptian" fits with Hebrew languages and how they fit with Biblical-era languages and KJV English, there may be lots of other room for discussion, even if it's fantasy discussion based on an unproven premise that "reformed Egyptian" is a real language.

But as far as the question of divine inspiration, the logical conclusion from the evidence seems pretty straightforward: The Hebrew phrases provide no evidence of support.

* It just occurred to me--is that where you disagree with conventional scientific-method logic? The average person would say that if there's a mundane explanation, that explanation should be assumed as the correct one unless other evidence comes forth. Are you saying that even if there's a mundane explanation, that explanation should carry no more weight than a supernatural explanation (a divinely inspired translation in this case)?

 

[JaysonR]

You inserted "all" presumably to gain some argumentative advantage, thus you distorted my position. Hmmm . . . why does the word "dishonesty" come to mind?

Because you wish me to be dishonest for that would be easy for you to dismiss me and not have to bother yourself with my points.

I summarized as "all" simply because your claim did not employ a limitation; which, in English, does imply an all inclusive claim.

I asked:

Are you seriously suggesting that the LDS organization has not impacted anyone negatively simply because one individual has not given you an example of impact upon their own self?

You responded:

Of course not. How would it be possible for an organization the size and reach of the LDS Church to not have, in some unintended way, impacted someone negatively?

The point raised against in this section was that there are negative impacts by their merits and choices in beliefs and organization.
Your response was that of course unintentional negative impacts occur.

The only qualifier you supplied was that of "someone".

If you did not intend to quality all negative impacts as unintentional, then:
A) your response was not a response to the topical point of the LDS negative impacts upon individuals over its history.
B) we can go back and accept that the LDS does intentionally cause negative impact on some individuals, and has done so repeatedly throughout their history - once again, this does not mean they are evil or entirely errant.

 

[skyrider44]

None of the cited idioms are unique to the Book of Mormon and incapable of being copied from the King James Version of the Bible - in fact, it is more likely that they were copied from the King James Version of the Bible as the idioms are very like near copies of sections in the King James in some cases.

I never said the idioms I listed were unique to the BoM. In fact, I made a point of saying that J.S. could have, indeed, extracted them from the Bible.
As I recall, you didn't ask for Hebrew idioms that were unique to the BoM.
I do, however, commend you for your in-depth research.

 

[Pup]

I never said the idioms I listed were unique to the BoM. In fact, I made a point of saying that J.S. could have, indeed, extracted them from the Bible.
As I recall, you didn't ask for Hebrew idioms that were unique to the BoM.
I do, however, commend you for your in-depth research.

What do you think the idioms are evidence of, and why? What is their significance?

For context, sorta see my previous post before this one.

 

[Craig4]

You are unaware, apparently, that many churches sponsor humanitarian, non-sacramental, non-doctrinal services for people in need. Actually, I'm certain you are aware of that; you simply couldn't resist the opportunity to take a cheap shot.

Well, we are talking about the Mormon church which is a target rich environment in the realm of cheap shots.

ETA, I notice you didn't mention my post about BYU scholars, the BoM and horses. Can't imagine why.

 

[skyrider44]

Because you wish me to be dishonest for that would be easy for you to dismiss me and not have to bother yourself with my points.

Lighten up. I referred to "dishonest" because, in similar cases, it is a favorite characterization of me by a 24/7 poster. No offense intended.

I summarized as "all" simply because your claim did not employ a limitation; which, in English, does imply an all inclusive claim.

It's sound practice to write as "tightly" as possible.

I asked:

You responded:


The point raised against in this section was that there are negative impacts by their merits and choices in beliefs and organization.
Your response was that of course unintentional negative impacts occur.

The only qualifier you supplied was that of "someone".

If you did not intend to quality quantify?all negative impacts as unintentional, then:
A) your response was not a response to the topical point of the LDS negative impacts upon individuals over its history.
B) we can go back and accept that the LDS does intentionally cause negative impact on some individuals, and has done so repeatedly throughout their history - once again, this does not mean they are evil or entirely errant.

Re. B), the fact that negative impacts occur does not mean they were intentional, just as the fact that friendly fire kills some soldiers in war does not mean they were intentional.

 

[Giordano]

I never said the idioms I listed were unique to the BoM. In fact, I made a point of saying that J.S. could have, indeed, extracted them from the Bible.
As I recall, you didn't ask for Hebrew idioms that were unique to the BoM.
I do, however, commend you for your in-depth research.

As I recall, I believe his posts were in response to your question(s) as to how Smith could possibly know these idioms unless the BofM was divinely inspired. So your post was not presented as evidence of the BofM being divine, but only as a chatty statement of no real significance?

 

[abaddon]

I never said the idioms I listed were unique to the BoM.

You wrote:

You might want to produce a credible answer to this question: How could Joseph Smith (an uneducated young man) have been able to include ancient Hebrew literary writing styles (idioms and chiasmus) in the Book of Mormon— elements that were not discovered until after his death?

Try grasping the scope of that.

You answered:

In fact, I made a point of saying that J.S. could have, indeed, extracted them from the Bible.

Which obviates what you, yourself wrote. You concede that Joe simply copied style from the existing bible. No further scope is required.

As I recall, you didn't ask for Hebrew idioms that were unique to the BoM.

It is the very fulcrum of your claim to some uniqueness to the BoM that Joe used idioms not available elsewhere. You have conceded that these same idioms were freely available to Joe in extant texts. You have further conceded that Joe could easily have copied same.

I do, however, commend you for your in-depth research.

Grudgingly. Jayson's erudition has placed you sitting naked at the very apex of an obsidian cone of knowledge and everyone forgot to bring any sort of lube.

 

[Giordano]

Lighten up. I referred to "dishonest" because, in similar cases, it is a favorite characterization of me by a 24/7 poster. No offense intended.



It's sound practice to write as "tightly" as possible.



Re. B), the fact that negative impacts occur does not mean they were intentional, just as the fact that friendly fire kills some soldiers in war does not mean they were intentional.

Do you disagree that the Church knew of and thus intentionally implemented actions with negative impacts? Because I recall a recent post that demonstrated this quite clearly, and you haven't specifically addressed why this post was incorrect. Perhaps you can explain your point of view here?

 

[Giordano]

You don't know a fraction of what BYU apologists know about the BoM. You speak of examining "pages upon pages" in the BoM. BYU researchers have spent years—in some cases, their entire professional lives—studying the BoM.

Two points, once again:
1. The BofM is not by itself proof of anything in the BofM. So you can study it as much as you want, but that alone will not provide concrete evidence of the truth of anything that is written in it.

2. I think again you are confusing what the other posters are saying: not that everything in the BofM is untrue (refutation of such a claim might be helped by reading all of the BofM to find something that matches what we do know from hard evidence) but that important parts of the BofM are untrue (which require only knowledge of the relevant parts of the BofM). Do you have any evidence that refutes the later, particularly in regard to that which has been called into question by the other posters here?

One can accuse me of lying about my height without accusing me of lying about everything I say. Although if I lie about one topic you might suspect I would lie about certain others.

 

[JaysonR]

I never said the idioms I listed were unique to the BoM. In fact, I made a point of saying that J.S. could have, indeed, extracted them from the Bible.
As I recall, you didn't ask for Hebrew idioms that were unique to the BoM.
I do, however, commend you for your in-depth research.

I did actually originally ask for unique Hebrew idioms to the BoM, for if the idioms exist in the KJV, then we cannot claim that the BoM is evidenced as divine or any other "right" claim by this point.

Further, the idioms in use are idioms directly derived uniquely (this is important here) from only the KJV and not the original Hebrew language.

The apologist you cited quite openly claimed that the idioms in the BoM were Literal Translations of Hebrew Idioms.
They are not such; they are copies of idioms as they appear in the KJV only; not literal translations of the Hebrew idioms.

As such, this position of validating the BoM by Hebrew idioms is not capable of employment.