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The Book of Mormon is a conundrum.


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24 minutes ago, Glenn101 said:

 I was wondering if the Book of Mormon could be analyzed on that basis, to see if the text shows evidence of coming as an oral presentation pretty much extemporaneously or dictated from an already written text? Is there a way of doing that?

I an neither of those brothers, but I'll give an opinion. Yes, I think there is ample evidence that oral style permeates the written text. The problem is, I think that it is inherent to the original writers, so it only tells us that Nephite culture was primarily oral--it doesn't really help with the question of Joseph's language.

There is a second problem with Joseph's dialect, however. Although his family was quite familiar with the KJV and used language similar to in it more formal situations (such as letters), it is doubtful that it represented the common speech. There were any number of books that were written in a pseudo-archaic style, and we should not consider any of those to represent daily speech. It was a type of speech that was affected for the purposes of the text. 

Therefore, if we could recover Joseph's spoken dialect, it really wouldn't answer the question. We would have to have a text that Joseph wrote or dictated that had those features, but was not revealed.

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I'm pretty skeptical of the oral hypothesis. I know there's someone else at T&S who is a linguistic who disagrees with my take who is going to do a separate post next week with his interpretation of the data so I'd wait for that. He thinks the grammar could arise unconsciously as KJV language is assimilated at a young age. (Although I might not be doing justice to his thesis) My view is that if this could happen orally that we'd find it in the many revival preachers characteristic of the 19th century. That we don't find it in their sermons makes me very skeptical it'd arise in Joseph in a completely different fashion.

So I'm convinced, but I think to really nail the thesis the oral transcripts from the London court trials should be examined. That's the best source for oral speech we have that I know of.

 

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3 hours ago, Brant Gardner said:

I an neither of those brothers, but I'll give an opinion. Yes, I think there is ample evidence that oral style permeates the written text. The problem is, I think that it is inherent to the original writers, so it only tells us that Nephite culture was primarily oral--it doesn't really help with the question of Joseph's language.

There is a second problem with Joseph's dialect, however. Although his family was quite familiar with the KJV and used language similar to in it more formal situations (such as letters), it is doubtful that it represented the common speech. There were any number of books that were written in a pseudo-archaic style, and we should not consider any of those to represent daily speech. It was a type of speech that was affected for the purposes of the text. 

Therefore, if we could recover Joseph's spoken dialect, it really wouldn't answer the question. We would have to have a text that Joseph wrote or dictated that had those features, but was not revealed.

Brant, thanks for your input. The Book of Mormon is a hodgepodge of passages that are clearly supposed to be oral and clearly supposed to be written commentary, such as the words of Mormon. But, if the whole thing came from Joseph extemporaneously, the whole kit and caboodle should come across as an oral communication. But I agree with your last sentence.

1 hour ago, clarkgoble said:

I'm pretty skeptical of the oral hypothesis. I know there's someone else at T&S who is a linguistic who disagrees with my take who is going to do a separate post next week with his interpretation of the data so I'd wait for that. He thinks the grammar could arise unconsciously as KJV language is assimilated at a young age. (Although I might not be doing justice to his thesis) My view is that if this could happen orally that we'd find it in the many revival preachers characteristic of the 19th century. That we don't find it in their sermons makes me very skeptical it'd arise in Joseph in a completely different fashion.

So I'm convinced, but I think to really nail the thesis the oral transcripts from the London court trials should be examined. That's the best source for oral speech we have that I know of.

 

Could you let us know who the linguist blogger is? I would like to see his evidence and conclusions?

Glenn

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10 hours ago, Glenn101 said:

Clark and Stanford, quoted both of you without quoting anything because I wanted to ask both of you a question. The subject has been brought up concerning oral versus written speech, i.e. that they differ considerably. The idea being that Joseph's oral speech may have contained a lot of [Early Modern English]. If it did, it would pretty much mean that Joseph was the author or that the spiritual part of the translation process had very little to do with his speech patterns.

I was wondering if the Book of Mormon could be analyzed on that basis, to see if the text shows evidence of coming as an oral presentation pretty much extemporaneously or dictated from an already written text? Is there a way of doing that?

Well, it's usually the case that written language is more conservative and spoken language less conservative. So it's actually a suspect proposal in the first place.

But the difference here is that we might have intentional archaism by spoken language. That is, the idea is that if Joseph was the author of the words, his oral production with the intent to be archaic might produce the archaic syntax of the Book of Mormon.

The problem with this is that he produced a lot of archaic syntax that the textual record indicates he didn't have implicit knowledge of. And there is also formal archaic language, which there's a slight possibility he had knowledge of, language that was confined to written registers by Joseph's time, such as legal or poetic language maintaining archaism like "after that ye shall have witnessed him".

As for obsolete syntax, there isn't currently any evidence that the phraseology "of which hath been spoken" (and variants) persisted into the late modern era. Because of obsolescence and the formal nature of the language, Joseph wasn't any more likely to have produced this orally than he was in writing. The value of the distinction breaks down.

Edited by champatsch
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11 hours ago, clarkgoble said:

He thinks the grammar could arise unconsciously as KJV language is assimilated at a young age.

Well, I'll be interested to see it, since I know the subject matter well.

Book of Mormon archaism doesn't pattern like King James archaism in many different domains. And there is a lot of specific archaic usage that isn't found in the King James Bible. I just mentioned one, again, "of which/whom hath/has been spoken". "Things that/which is" is another one. Etc.

The verbal system is early modern in character but not King James style in most tenses. The closest one to King James style is the future tense, but even there the inversion rate in the Book of Mormon is more archaic (a higher rate of inversion) and the future subjunctive usage rate (conditional shall usage) is higher than it is in the King James Bible, which for the most part lacks mandative shall after verbs like cause, command, and suffer.

Edited by champatsch
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6 hours ago, Glenn101 said:
10 hours ago, Brant Gardner said:

Therefore, if we could recover Joseph's spoken dialect, it really wouldn't answer the question. We would have to have a text that Joseph wrote or dictated that had those features, but was not revealed.

Brant, thanks for your input. The Book of Mormon is a hodgepodge of passages that are clearly supposed to be oral and clearly supposed to be written commentary, such as the words of Mormon. But, if the whole thing came from Joseph extemporaneously, the whole kit and caboodle should come across as an oral communication. But I agree with your last sentence.

The 1832 History has many archaic features. That is an example of a non-revealed text that Joseph wrote or dictated where he archaized. And importantly, it clearly shows that three prominent syntactic features of the Book of Mormon were not part of Joseph's own spoken or written patterns, all of which is supported by the general textual record.

An enhanced, corrected version of my paper on the subject (Stanford Carmack, “How Joseph Smith’s Grammar Differed from Book of Mormon Grammar: Evidence from the 1832 History”, Interpreter 25, 239–259) is available in Royal Skousen, The Nature of the Original Language (2018), in the essay "The Syntax in Joseph Smith’s 1832 History", 612–620. Skousen thought the subject matter and the findings were significant enough to include in the critical text project.

Edited by champatsch
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13 hours ago, Glenn101 said:

The idea being that Joseph's oral speech may have contained a lot of EModE. If it did, it would pretty much mean that Joseph was the author or that the spiritual part of the translation process had very little to do with his speech patterns.

Joseph's spoken language was just like that of those around him; it had a few elements that could be called archaic, but the vast majority of his usage patterns were late modern, and his particular dialect shared many features with standard American English.

The more fruitful approach (but not without its serious problems) is to claim that Joseph was overdoing archaism with the intent to deceive, so that even pseudo-biblical writings aren't a standard by which to measure the Book of Mormon, something like the following:

On 3/24/2019 at 10:50 AM, Physics Guy said:

That paper examined pseudo-Biblical works written by educated authors with the intent of amusing book-buyers, rather than texts dictated by uneducated authors with the intent to deceive. So its conclusion that fake archaism could not have produced the Book of Mormon's grammar is like concluding that orange fruits can't exist, because all the fruits in a sample of apples were red.

Earlier, Physics Guy claimed that pseudo-biblical authors limited their archaism:

On 10/21/2018 at 7:21 PM, Physics Guy said:

The pseudo-Biblical works you've looked at so far do not count for this because their educated authors had both will and means to avoid excess archaism.

Of course, how does Physics Guy know that they limited their archaism? By what criteria did he determine that? Maybe he can tell us how he knows they deliberately avoided excess archaism. And so he makes the related point that Joseph Smith produced overdone archaism:

On 10/23/2018 at 11:21 AM, Physics Guy said:

overdone archaism by an uneducated writer who lacked time, ability, and motivation to refine his grammar

Again, we need to ask how he knows that the archaism of the dictation was overdone. By what measure has he determined that? From what I can tell, knowing the subject matter very well, I think it's just a label he's applied in order to make an argument. He's not an expert on archaic syntax, yet he writes here as though he is. Indeed, how much of the Book of Mormon has he read, and how often? How much of the King James Bible has he read in order to compare usage?

Those that have read the Book of Mormon and the King James Bible a lot know that the former is easier to read and understand than the latter. The reading often bogs down in extended biblical passages. So if the Book of Mormon really does have overdone archaism, then it obviously doesn't interfere with comprehension. This is one point indicating that the archaism isn't actually overdone.

Now, the Book of Mormon's archaism does exceed that of the King James Bible in some domains, but that doesn't necessarily make it overdone. It may be that in those domains the King James Bible just has a little archaism. And of course some archaism makes understanding more difficult and some does not.

And then there is the undeniable reality that the archaism of the Book of Mormon is systematically different from that of the King James Bible, in many different domains.  So the oral argument, relying on Joseph's knowledge of the biblical archaism, breaks down. It cannot explain the verbal system, verb complementation, auxiliary usage, inflections, inversion rates, the personal relative pronoun system, etc.

Edited by champatsch
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On 3/27/2019 at 12:07 AM, Robert F. Smith said:

This is one of your strongest points.  You should use it as the fulcrum of your entire case.  At the very same time, the notion that America was the Indies was a huge mistake, not really assuaged by the backhanded claim that we are the West Indies.

It would not be a mistake to an author in the 16th century. 16th century scholars and traders (including Columbus) believed that Israelites inhabited the islands of the Indies. As far as I can tell, no 16th century author ever made the claim that Jews sailed through the Indies to America. On the contrary there are substantial texts claiming that Israelite colonies inhabited the Indies. Its even right there in the Book of Mormon:

2 Nephi 10:21 "But great are the promises of the Lord unto them who are upon the isles of the sea; wherefore as it says isles, there must needs be more than this, and they are inhabited also by our brethren. For behold, the Lord God has led away from time to time from the house of Israel, according to his will and pleasure."

Stated simply, if the author of the Book of Mormon lived in the 16th century, it is certain that the intended setting of the text was the islands of the Indies, believed to be inhabited by a number of Israelite groups. It wasn't until 1650 that Menasseh Ben Israel claimed that some Jews may have made it to continental South America, but even he argues against Native Americans being descendants of Jews.

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The problem becomes even more complicated, if and only if the gold Book of Mormon plates found in upstate New York have nothing at all to do with the East Indies.  The EModE translator might indeed be fooled by his East Indies purview, but the content of the plates should be inconsistent with that view. How can such conflicts be reconciled?

Again, an Early Modern English author was far more likely to write a text about Israelites in the isles, not on the American continent. Make no mistake, the internal geography of the Book of Mormon fits the region that 16th century authors identified as the island peninsula inhabited by Jews who departed Israel in 600 BC. (videos 1, 2, 3)  If the author of the Book of Mormon wrote the text in the 16th century, does it not make sense that he would have been writing about the region that other 16th century authors identified as the home of Biblical groups who had been led away from time to time from the house of Israel? 

Edited by Rajah Manchou
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2 hours ago, Rajah Manchou said:

It would not be a mistake to an author in the 16th century. 16th century scholars and traders (including Columbus) believed that Israelites inhabited the islands of the Indies. As far as I can tell, no 16th century author ever made the claim that Jews sailed through the Indies to America. On the contrary there are substantial texts claiming that Israelite colonies inhabited the Indies. Its even right there in the Book of Mormon:

2 Nephi 10:21 "But great are the promises of the Lord unto them who are upon the isles of the sea; wherefore as it says isles, there must needs be more than this, and they are inhabited also by our brethren. For behold, the Lord God has led away from time to time from the house of Israel, according to his will and pleasure."

Stated simply, if the author of the Book of Mormon lived in the 16th century, it is certain that the intended setting of the text was the islands of the Indies, believed to be inhabited by a number of Israelite groups. It wasn't until 1650 that Menasseh Ben Israel claimed that some Jews may have made it to continental South America, but even he argues against Native Americans being descendants of Jews.

Again, an Early Modern English author was far more likely to write a text about Israelites in the isles, not on the American continent. Make no mistake, the internal geography of the Book of Mormon fits the region that 16th century authors identified as the island peninsula inhabited by Jews who departed Israel in 600 BC. (videos 1, 2, 3)  If the author of the Book of Mormon wrote the text in the 16th century, does it not make sense that he would have been writing about the region that other 16th century authors identified as the home of Biblical groups who had been led away from time to time from the house of Israel? 

Of course, if we are positing an EModE author of the Book of Mormon as pure fiction, or even historical fiction, naturally all this would fit rather well.  Then the thus far inexplicable trick would be how to get the manuscript into the hands of Joseph Smith Jr several generations later, so that he could read it to his scribes -- with all the difficulties which perpetrating that hoax would involve.  I anxiously await a full accounting as to how that pseudepigraphon was successfully fobbed off on so many people.

One thing we might want to note is that "isles of the sea" in Hebrew and Egyptian frequently refers to coastal areas, rather than true islands, so no biblical or BofM text with that phrase is evidence.  Merely suggestive.

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16 hours ago, Robert F. Smith said:

Of course, if we are positing an EModE author of the Book of Mormon as pure fiction, or even historical fiction, naturally all this would fit rather well.  Then the thus far inexplicable trick would be how to get the manuscript into the hands of Joseph Smith Jr several generations later, so that he could read it to his scribes -- with all the difficulties which perpetrating that hoax would involve.  I anxiously await a full accounting as to how that pseudepigraphon was successfully fobbed off on so many people.

I'm not arguing that it is fiction or even historical fiction. I suppose it could be, but my hypothesis is that the text is entirely historically accurate. I've shared the archeological findings that clearly date the arrival of an iron-age founding group in 582 BC, seven years after the Lehites departed. I've also shared the archeological findings in the north of the peninsula, another Iron-age civilization arrives in the 6th-5th century BC. It is said this civilization was founded by an exiled prince who shared the name of the king of the Achaemenid dynasty [1] when the Mulekites had departed [2]. Even today, one of the great warrior kings of this civilization is known as Maroni, one of the original spellings of Moroni in the Book of Mormon.

I've provided plenty of evidence for a historical Book of Mormon over the past three years, there's been no interest in actually engaging or discussing it.

Quote

One thing we might want to note is that "isles of the sea" in Hebrew and Egyptian frequently refers to coastal areas, rather than true islands, so no biblical or BofM text with that phrase is evidence.  Merely suggestive.

Jacob says in 545 BC "wherefore as it says isles, there must needs be more than this, and they are inhabited also by our brethren" This does not sound like Jacob was referring to the coastal areas of America. He clearly defines it. It says islands, so there must be many more than this (referring to the isle that he was on) and they are inhabited by other Israelite brothers that were led away by God from time to time. There are many islands or coasts inhabited by Israelites.

This is how the world was seen by Jewish and Christian authors up until 1650, hundreds and thousands of islands from the Red Sea to India and beyond, and they were inhabited by Israelites. Take another example, the Iggeret orhot olam the first Hebrew text to mention the Americas. The author describes all the different locations across the Indies where Israelites were known to live. He then dismisses the idea that Americans were possible descendants of Israelites. This was a popular text, published widely in the 16th and 17th centuries.

What I am saying is that the Book of Mormon narrative lines up with the geographical understanding of authors like Abraham ben Mordecai Farissol. Not only that, but it lines up with history. I can't explain it, but Joseph Smith dictated a text that describes the geography and history of a real world location that has been known for millennia as the home of Israelites who left Jerusalem in 600 BC.

--------

[1]. Legend says that Kambu Swayambhuva was a learned prince who had initially been an Indian king. He had ventured into the far East and became the founder of the Khmer (Kamboja) civilization. Numerous Muslim writings of medieval era spell the Kamboj clan name as Kambu as well as Kambo. Obviously, these Kambu/Kambo terms are the corrupted forms of Kambuj/Kamboj and relate to the Kamboja of ancient Sanskrit and Pali texts and Inscriptions. This Sanskrit Kamboja appears as K.b.u.ji.i.y, Kabujiya or perhaps Kabaujiya/Kaboujiya and Kambujiya or perhaps Kambaujiya ( OR with -n- in place of -m- as Kanbujiya or Kanbaujiya) of Old Persian inscriptions, and Cambyses of Greek writings. The same name appears as C-n-b-n-z-y in Aramaic, Kambuzia in Assyrian, Kambythet in Egyptian, Kam-bu-zi-ya or Ka-am-bu-zi-ya in Akkadian, Kan-bu-zi-ia or Kan-bu-si-ya in Elamite, and Kanpuziya in the Susan language (cf: Ancient Kamboja in Iran and Islam, p 69, Dr H. W. Bailey). Source

[2]. Cambyses I or Cambyses the Elder (via Latin from Greek Καμβύσης, from Old Persian Kambūǰiya, Aramaic Knbwzy; c. 600 BC – 559 BC) was king of Anshan from c. 580 to 559 BC. Though numerous scholars link Cambyses to the Sanskrit tribal name Kamboja there are also few scholars who suggest Elamite origin of the name. Source

Edited by Rajah Manchou
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9 hours ago, Robert F. Smith said:

I anxiously await a full accounting as to how that pseudepigraphon was successfully fobbed off on so many people.

Your suggestion is probably the most plausible. John Dee was obsessed with finding, and colonizing, the legendary land of Locach.

John Dee and the Map of North-East Asia

Locach is Nakorn Si Thammarat on the Malay Peninsula, identified as Xara or Zara on early maps. This historical civilization was know as Srah and it dates back to the 6th century BC. It is Zarahemla on the maps I've proposed above. 

In short, the region John Dee and other EmodE scholars were writing about matches the phyiscal geography, history and descriptions given in the Book of Mormon, even down to the names of the cities and states as they were known in Arabic texts that would have been available to those 16th century authors: Kamara, Rahma, Sidon, Moron etc.

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On 3/30/2019 at 3:01 PM, champatsch said:

[H]ow does Physics Guy know that [pseudo-Biblical authors] limited their archaism?  ... Again, we need to ask how he knows that the archaism of the dictation was overdone. By what measure has he determined that?

I'm not the one claiming to rule out an authorship theory on linguistic grounds. You are. I'm just pointing out loopholes in your argument. Just as a matter of logic, I don't have to do anything to prove that authors limited their archaism or that Smith overdid his fake archaism. You have to provide strong evidence that they almost certainly didn't and that he almost certainly could not have. Or else you have to back off from your claim that Smith could not have written the Book of Mormon.

This isn't geometry. You don't need to prove things to mathematical certainty. But if you want to establish your conclusion beyond a reasonable doubt, you need to cover reasonable loopholes like mine. Those other authors clearly differed from Joseph Smith in ways that might reasonably affect their ability to produce controlled archaism. And how do we know that an author like Smith would not have produced grammar like the Book of Mormon by systematic error, hypercorrecting and overgeneralizing in a clumsy effort to imitate the King James Bible? Maybe the possibility seems remote to you, but as far as I know there has been no actual analysis of what fake archaism by uneducated con artists tends to be like. Raising a completely un-analyzed issue that is crucial to your conclusion is pointing out another reasonable loophole.

I'm not saying anything at all against the hypothesis that someone from the 16th century wrote the Book of Mormon. I'm only attacking your apparent claim to have established your hypothesis as probable fact. If you can't cover the reasonable loopholes, you haven't established the conclusion beyond a reasonable doubt.

Edited by Physics Guy
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3 hours ago, Physics Guy said:

I'm not the one claiming to rule out an authorship theory on linguistic grounds. You are. I'm just pointing out loopholes in your argument. Just as a matter of logic, I don't have to do anything to prove that authors limited their archaism or that Smith overdid his fake archaism. You have to provide strong evidence that they almost certainly didn't and that he almost certainly could not have. Or else you have to back off from your claim that Smith could not have written the Book of Mormon.

This isn't geometry. You don't need to prove things to mathematical certainty. But if you want to establish your conclusion beyond a reasonable doubt, you need to cover reasonable loopholes like mine. Those other authors clearly differed from Joseph Smith in ways that might reasonably affect their ability to produce controlled archaism. And how do we know that an author like Smith would not have produced grammar like the Book of Mormon by systematic error, hypercorrecting and overgeneralizing in a clumsy effort to imitate the King James Bible? Maybe the possibility seems remote to you, but as far as I know there has been no actual analysis of what fake archaism by uneducated con artists tends to be like. Raising a completely un-analyzed issue that is crucial to your conclusion is pointing out another reasonable loophole.

I'm not saying anything at all against the hypothesis that someone from the 16th century wrote the Book of Mormon. I'm only attacking your apparent claim to have established your hypothesis as probable fact. If you can't cover the reasonable loopholes, you haven't established the conclusion beyond a reasonable doubt.

In trying to think of the big picture, I have concluded that this issue boils down to whether one thinks that a lack of biblical support and late modern support for Book of Mormon usage is meaningful—that is, indicative of improbable coincidence with earlier usage.  From what I can tell, your position is that lack of such support for original Book of Mormon usage is not meaningful.

I don't see the oral/written distinction as important, since they both depend on native-speaker competence. In any event, producing a considerable amount of non-native language (in this case, pseudo-biblical language) is more likely in contemplative writing than it is in relatively fast oral production. This follows from the reality that a pseudo-biblical author has to consciously depart, in form and structure, from subconscious, native-speaker patterns in a persistent manner.

You too often leave the wrong impression about Book of Mormon language, such as that its archaism is "clumsy", even though the vast majority of it doesn't objectively qualify as such. Skousen has pointed out in NOL the few things that objectively qualify as "clumsy", the basis for determining clumsiness being a lack of external support.

As I wrote elsewhere, human creativity means that any knowledgeable person can make a case for hypercorrection about any English usage. But in the case of the original Book of Mormon text, a reasonable person admits that the odds of hypercorrection are extremely low and tenuous in the absence of external support, as determined by careful, systematic analysis of a wide variety of attested usage.

Edited by champatsch
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1 hour ago, Gervin said:

is there a public (free) site that one can view and navigate (all or part of) the original (pre-published) Book of Mormon narrative as it was dictated from Joseph's mouth?

I think this may be what you are looking for:

https://bookofmormoncentral.org/content/book-mormon-earliest-text

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3 minutes ago, Gervin said:

Can’t seem to get this to work, but thanks

The text is full of strange smilies for me.  My computer isn't hooked up so can't check to see if a problem with my tech or not.

Edited by Calm
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1 hour ago, Gervin said:

I guess what I was asking for, without knowing what to ask for, is a reproduction of the original manuscript - or that portion that survives.  Is it available anywhere?

I've also been hunting for something available online and couldn't find anything more than this.

There's very little left of the original manuscript that was directly transcribed by Oliver, John Whitmer and an unknown scribe while Joseph dictated. Although given the provenance of the original manuscript, I don't know how it can be proven to be what it is said to be.

Edited by Rajah Manchou
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10 hours ago, Gervin said:

I guess what I was asking for, without knowing what to ask for, is a reproduction of the original manuscript - or that portion that survives.  Is it available anywhere?

28 percent extant, some of it very hard to read, images to be published in the future as part of the JSP project.

2001 paleographic transcription available in one volume, part of the Book of Mormon critical text project, edited by Skousen.

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9 hours ago, Rajah Manchou said:

I've also been hunting for something available online and couldn't find anything more than this.

There's very little left of the original manuscript that was directly transcribed by Oliver, John Whitmer and an unknown scribe while Joseph dictated. Although given the provenance of the original manuscript, I don't know how it can be proven to be what it is said to be.

You da man.  Thanks 

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30 minutes ago, champatsch said:

28 percent extant, some of it very hard to read, images to be published in the future as part of the JSP project.

2001 paleographic transcription available in one volume, part of the Book of Mormon critical text project, edited by Skousen.

Are any EModE phrases or words found in the extant portions?

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10 hours ago, Rajah Manchou said:

I've also been hunting for something available online and couldn't find anything more than this.

There's very little left of the original manuscript that was directly transcribed by Oliver, John Whitmer and an unknown scribe while Joseph dictated. Although given the provenance of the original manuscript, I don't know how it can be proven to be what it is said to be.

Why only the four pages published?

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1 hour ago, Gervin said:

Why only the four pages published?

Probably because they don't want to publish it piecemeal and they don't have it all ready to publish yet.

Source note: "The excerpt below—not a complete text, but included to provide a sense of the Book of Mormon text—is featured because it contains the work of the three scribes whose handwriting is found in the extant portion of the manuscript and because the document is in relatively good condition."

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