Mayan Warfare at BYU

Although I don't write about the topic on this blog much any more, the topic is apparently thriving at BYU, based on this headline:

"Dr. Stephen Houston Speaking on Mayan Warfare at BYU"

The Mayan warfare at BYU apparently involves the M2C advocates and the handful of professors who still believe what the prophets have taught about the New York Cumorah. 

I hope someone attends and takes notes for me.

The fiction narrative - Grapes of thorns

Fantasy map: the seed of fiction

Unless there is a change of course soon, within a few years it will become commonplace for faithful members of the Church to believe and teach that the Book of Mormon is fiction. Even today it's not unusual to meet active members who think this.

The seeds of the fiction narrative have already been planted in the minds of the youth.

It seems unlikely, to say the least, that the fiction narrative will produce the fruit of strong testimonies and conviction.

After all, do men gather grapes of thorns, or figs of thistles?

From the time a handful of scholars persuaded so many LDS to disbelieve the teachings of the prophets about the New York Cumorah, the fiction narrative became inevitable.

IOW, the M2C narrative leads directly to the fiction narrative. Looking for Book of Mormon events in Mesoamerica is like looking for Biblical sites in eastern China because there are ancient cities there. If one tried hard enough, one could find "correspondences" between those ancient cities and the descriptions in the Bible, applying the same circular reasoning that the M2C advocates apply to "see" the Book of Mormon in Mesoamerica.
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Some people find it impossible to believe that the fiction narrative would ever become mainstream in the Church.

But the seed of fiction cannot produce the fruit of divine authenticity.

Think about the fruit another seed has produced.

Twenty years ago, members of the Church would have said it was impossible that someday, LDS scholars would teach that Joseph Smith didn't really translate the Book of Mormon, that he didn't use the Urim and Thummim that came with the plates, and that he didn't even use the plates themselves.

After all, Joseph and Oliver consistently and persistently taught that Joseph translated the engravings on the plates with the Urim and Thummim. The revelations in the D&C teach the same thing. The prophets have reaffirmed their testimony innumerable times over the years.

And yet, here we are today.

The ideas that Joseph didn't use the plates, didn't use the Urim and Thummim, and didn't translate anything is completely mainstream.

Scene from Church film that teaches the
stone-in-a-hat theory of translation

This is a still image from a movie now being shown in visitors centers that depict Joseph Smith staring at a stone in a hat to dictate the text, while the plates remain under a cloth, a useless prop.

The script for this film was adapted from a passage in the 1834 book, Mormonism Unvailed.

Here is the passage.

Mormonism
Unvailed,
now playing at a
Visitors Center
near you

The translation finally commenced. They were found to contain a language not now known upon the earth, which they termed "reformed Egyptian characters." The plates, therefore, which had been so much talked of, were found to be of no manner of use. After all, the Lord showed and communicated to him [Joseph] every word and letter of the Book. Instead of looking at the characters inscribed upon the plates, the prophet was obliged to resort to the old ''peep stone," which he formerly used in money-digging. This he placed in a hat, or box, into which he also thrust his face. Through the stone he could then discover a single word at a time, which he repeated aloud to his amanuensis, who committed it to paper, when another word would immediately appear, and thus the performance continued to the end of the book. 

The screenwriters could have chosen instead to use the scriptures for a text, but the scholars and film producers claim the scriptures are, at best, misleading. They prefer Mormonism Unvailed over the scriptures.

Actually, they could have used another passage from Mormonism Unvailed:

Another account they give of the transaction, is, that it was performed with the big spectacles before mentioned, and which were in fact, the identical Urim and Thumim mentioned in Exodus 28 — 30...

Of course, the second version is the one Joseph and Oliver testified was true. Right in the Pearl of Great Price, where everyone can read it, we have their testimony:

Having removed the earth, I obtained a lever, which I got fixed under the edge of the stone, and with a little exertion raised it up. I looked in, and there indeed did I behold the plates, the Urim and Thummim, and the breastplate, as stated by the messenger. ...  immediately after my arrival [in Pennsylvania] I commenced copying the characters off the plates. I copied a considerable number of them, and by means of the Urim and Thummim I translated some of them... Two days after the arrival of Mr. Cowdery (being the 7th of April) I commenced to translate the Book of Mormon, and he began to write for me.
(Joseph Smith—History 1:52, 62, 67)

Oliver Cowdery describes these events thus: “These were days never to be forgotten—to sit under the sound of a voice dictated by the inspiration of heaven, awakened the utmost gratitude of this bosom! Day after day I continued, uninterrupted, to write from his mouth, as he translated with the Urim and Thummim, or, as the Nephites would have said, ‘Interpreters,’ the history or record called ‘The Book of Mormon.’
(Joseph Smith—History, Note, 1)

I realize that our revisionist historians claim that when Joseph and Oliver used the term Urim and Thummim they actually meant the peep stone; i.e., they claim Joseph and Oliver were misleading the Church by using a code word for the peep stone described in Mormonism Unvailed. 

That's how they rationalize using Mormonism Unvailed instead of the scriptures to explain Church history and the origins of the Book of Mormon.

You can read it right in the Saints book, volume 1.

Buried with the plates, Moroni said, were two seer stones, which Joseph later called the Urim and Thummim, or interpreters. The Lord had prepared these stones to help Joseph translate the record.... Sometimes Joseph translated by looking through the interpreters and reading in English the characters on the plates. Often he found a single seer stone to be more convenient. He would put the seer stone in his hat, place his face into the hat to block out the light, and peer at the stone. Light from the stone would shine in the darkness, revealing words that Joseph dictated as Oliver rapidly copied them down.

Saints, Volume 1, pp. 22, 61, available here:
https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/bc/content/ldsorg/media-library/ebook-pdf/Saints-v1-English-PD60001624.pdf?lang=eng

Saints teaches revisionist history that directly contradicts the scriptures quoted above and everything that Joseph and Oliver said about the translation. For example, here's what Joseph actually said about the Urim and Thummim:

He said unto me I am a Messenger sent from God, be faithful and keep his commandments in all things. He told me also of a sacred record which was written on plates of gold. I saw in the vision the place where they were deposited. He said to me the Indians were the literal decendants of Abraham. He explained many of the prophecies to me; one of which I will mention, which is in Malachi 4th chapter. Behold, the day of the Lord cometh <​(&c​> He also informed me that the Urim & Thummim was hid up with the record, and that God would give me power to translate it with the assistance of this instrument;

https://www.josephsmithpapers.org/paper-summary/history-1834-1836/64#full-transcript

It's undoubtedly true that several people testified they saw Joseph put a stone in a hat and dictate words. What they never testify to, however, is that Joseph said he was translating the Book of Mormon. They never relate what words he dictated. All the evidence indicates Joseph was demonstrating the process, not translating the Book of Mormon in front of an audience.

After all, Moroni (and the Lord) had told Joseph he could not show the plates or Urim and Thummim to anyone until the translation was complete. He couldn't possibly have translated the plates in public view without violating that prohibition.
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With the peep stone in the hat narrative as precedent, do you still think it's impossible that the seed of the fiction narrative will bear fruit?
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I posted some comments about the faith crisis here:

https://dearlatterdaysaints.blogspot.com/2019/10/faith-crisis-is-no-surprise-at-this.html

Paradigm shifts

Everyone loves and hates paradigm shifts, depending on whether they like or dislike the new paradigm. Everyone who promotes a new paradigm cites Thomas Kuhn and his Copernicus example, or another famous historical shift in understanding and perception. They don't cite the numerous attempts at creating a new paradigm that don't catch on because they are nonsense or because they are merely revivals of long-discredited ideas.
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People continue to ask about the stone-in-a-hat issue. As I anticipated, thousands of people left Education Week in Provo last August believing that (i) Joseph dictated the Book of Mormon by reading words that appeared on a metaphysical teleprompter (the peep stone in a hat) and (ii) Joseph didn't translate the plates but instead the words were provided by an unknown intermediary translator.

The purveyors of this narrative have tried to frame it as a "paradigm shift" because that sounds smart, cool, progressive, and informed.

This peep-stone-in-a-hat narrative was revived a few years ago by a group of LDS historians. They claim it is a "new paradigm" but they forgot to mention a key fact.

This is not a "new paradigm" at all. It's a zombie version of an old narrative that was killed years ago by Joseph Smith and Oliver Cowdery.

I discussed this here:

http://www.bookofmormoncentralamerica.com/2019/07/peep-stones-vs-urim-and-thummim-part-1.html 

In that post, I observed this:

We can understand the chronology of the alternative theories through a simple chiasmus:

Joseph produced the Book of Mormon by reading words off a stone-in-a-hat (critics) [1834]
     Joseph translated the plates with the Urim and Thummim (alternative account) [1834]
     Joseph translated the plates with the Urim and Thummim (taught for decades by LDS leaders) [1834-2015]

Joseph produced the Book of Mormon by reading words off a stone-in-a-hat (revisionist historians) [2015 to present] 

The "paradigm shift" was presented to BYU educators in this article that comes complete with the inevitable Kuhn/Copernicus reference:

https://rsc.byu.edu/review/fall-2016/mormon-paradigm-shifts-joseph-smiths-seer-stones 

Alert educators could tell something was up. The article is basically an ad for the book, From Darkness unto Light. Worse, the article pretends that the peep stone narrative is new, and that everyone in the Church needs to adjust to this "paradigm shift."

Nowhere does From Darkness unto Light quote or discuss the peep stone theory as it was introduced in 1834 in the book Mormonism Unvailed. I included the relevant passage in the link above, but here it is again:

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On page 18, which you can read here, Mormonism Unvailed acknowledges two alternative explanations of the translation. The first involved the seer stone (which the book calls a "peep stone") that Joseph put in a hat to read off the words that appeared. Setting aside the sarcasm of this passage, we can see that the first paragraph below is what our revisionist Church historians are teaching today (although they claim Joseph saw a group of words instead of a single word at a time).

The translation finally commenced. They were found to contain a language not now known upon the earth, which they termed "reformed Egyptian characters." The plates, therefore, which had been so much talked of, were found to be of no manner of use. After all, the Lord showed and communicated to him [Joseph] every word and letter of the Book. Instead of looking at the characters inscribed upon the plates, the prophet was obliged to resort to the old ''peep stone," which he formerly used in money-digging. This he placed in a hat, or box, into which he also thrust his face. Through the stone he could then discover a single word at a time, which he repeated aloud to his amanuensis, who committed it to paper, when another word would immediately appear, and thus the performance continued to the end of the book. 

https://archive.org/details/mormonismunvaile00howe/page/18

South Park depiction of the
stone-in-a-hat theory

This version of the translation was been infamously portrayed in an episode of South Park, as well as on many web pages critical of the Church.

Now, this stone-in-a-hat theory has been embraced in Church publications, as mentioned above.

Mormonism Unvailed acknowledged an alternative explanation of the translation. This is the explanation that Joseph and Oliver always gave, albeit not exactly the way it is explained in Mormonism Unvailed.

Another account they give of the transaction, is, that it was performed with the big spectacles before mentioned, and which were in fact, the identical Urim and Thumim mentioned in Exodus 28 — 30, and were brought away from Jerusalem by the heroes of the book, handed down from one generation to another, and finally buried up in Ontario county, some fifteen centuries since, to enable Smith to translate the plates without looking at them ! 

Mormonism Unvailed is not noted for accuracy in its presentation about the Book of Mormon. Here, the authors missed the points that (i) the Urim and Thummim that Joseph received was not brought from Jerusalem by Lehi but instead had been used by the Jaredites in America, and (ii) Joseph actually looked at the plates with the spectacles.

However, the passage quoted above makes a clear delineation between the stone-in-a-hat theory and the Urim and Thummim narrative. (Elsewhere in the book the authors distinguish between the peep stone and the spectacles.) Everyone who read Mormonism Unvailed understood these were two competing explanations of the translation of the Book of Mormon. There was no suggestion that Joseph, Oliver, or anyone else referred to the "seer stone" as the Urim and Thummim. All contemporary accounts referred to the interpreters Moroni put in the stone box as the Urim and Thummim.
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The peep stone theory is having the same effect today that Mr. Hurlbut hoped for when he published it in Mormonism Unvailed. The theory makes the plates themselves superfluous.

If an unknown "intermediary translator" could generate words that appeared on the metaphysical teleprompter (the peep stone in a hat), why did Mormon go to all the trouble of abridging the Nephite records? Why would the Nephites bother keeping records at all? Why would Moroni risk his life to preserve and add to the abridgment? Why bother with the plates of Nephi to replace the lost 116 pages?

Maybe we can replace the "paradigm shift" with another paradigm shift back to what the prophets have taught.