Mormon Times Article on If/And Conditionals

[mediator]

I think that the significance of the fact that a Hebraic conditional structure that has no known parallel in any period or regional dialect of English seems to appear in an English text claiming to derive from writers of Hebrew culture is (or ought to be) intuitively apparent.

Significance via assertion? I think you missed the point that in order for this to be true, then God must have intended to convey an erroneous translation. When asked to resolve this problem, you claim you haven't the foggiest idea why he would do that and then act like it isn't a problem at all. You really don't understand how this undermines your claim of "significance"? Your entire thesis is based on something you admittedly have no explanation for, and yet you seem to think the critics are the ones acting in desperation to "get rid" of something.

In any event, one Hebrew expert I know had this to say:

Peterson does a poor job of showing that the Hebrew conjunction "waw" in an if/then situation is actually more of a marker than it is an actual word. He should know this, since Arabic (his forte) does a little of that too. Even the famous "waw consecutive" has recently come under fire as a vehicle for marking and not for translating. The Masoretes might have been using the waw consecutive as a vehicular device, not a purely linguistic one. Regardless, the translation of "waw" in the if/then statements isn't rigid, and for the most part, doesn't HAVE to translate to "and."

Sometimes the waw-consecutive opens temporal clauses (when the "beth" preposition isn't used), in which case a person wouldn't go with "and," but rather something like "when." It all depends on context. A wooden Hebrew translation is typically frowned upon in academic circles anyway. It isn't helpful to start throwing down a bunch of bold claims from the cultural-linguistic milieu of the ANE without proper references. Moreover, it is HORRIBLY tacky to quote yourself at the end of an article.

So it doesn't even have to translate "and" at all? My, oh my. I see a house of cards beginning to fall.

I think that the language was Hebrew, and that "reformed Egyptian" signifies the script in which that language was written

This is irrelevant to the fact that the Church has traditionally taught, and continues to teach, that the mysterious language of "Reformed Egyptian" was the language in which the Book of Mormon was originally written. Anyone privy to this knowledge would automatically have reason to question the connection you were trying to make to Hebrew. You can't turn Reformed Egyptian into Hebrew with a wave of the hand, justifying it on the basis of a theory that seems to exist only for the sake of apologetic necessity.

LOL. I also didn't provide a history of Egyptian scripts, a comparative study of biblical, Mishnaic, and modern Hebrew, or a primer on Mayan.

Keep laughing, but the fact is you've written an article suggesting evidence of "divine hints" while responding to the only critical question by throwing your hands up and saying "I haven't the foggiest idea." Makes me wonder which side is really laughing.

As noted, I don't accept the "twice removed."

What you choose to accept here is not based on empirical fact, but rather apologetic convenience. Readers should know that the current text would necessarily be twice removed, according to official LDS teaching. The writers were Hebrew but they wrote in Reformed Egyptian, which is not Hebrew.

My hypothesis, obviously, is that it comes from the original language of the text

Clearly, but you provide no reasonable trajectory or coherent argument, other than to throw out some literary anecdotes and expect readers to jump to the same illicit conclusion. They could only do this is they were completely ignorant of the translation process.

I haven't the vaguest idea where you're deriving your expectations of what an inspired translation ought to look like.

I guess it derives from the crazy idea that an all knowing deity who is in the business of passing down translations scribbled on rocks, would provide the most accurate translation possible. I have no idea where you're deriving your expectations of an inspired translation being "contaminated." None of it makes sense really, but it seems to be designed specifically for apologetic purposes. For example, when the translation is wrong, it is contamination and whenever something could possibly resemble something from the ANE, then it is proof of divine inspiration. I guess this apologetic vehicle could get a lot of mileage with defending the Book of Abraham.

I have no theory of the translation process, and have no basis on which to formulate one.

And yet you feel comfortable writing apologetic articles while asserting a language contamination in a translation which you now admit knowing nothing about?

I simply point to the fact that seemingly Hebraic conditional sentence forms appear at several points in the earliest English Book of Mormon text that have no apparent precedent in any dialect or period of English.

But you seem unwilling or uninterested in entertaining other ideas that would explain this phenomena. Instead, you misrepresent the critics for trying to "get rid" of it altogether. Do you do this to make your apologetic seem stronger than it really is?

Empirical fact takes precedence for me, in this case, over speculative "theory."

Did you type this with a straight face? Your conclusion is entirely speculative. No one takes issue with the facts you presented, only the conclusion you arrived to.

Moreover, there is little or no evidence to suggest that such conditionals would have been produced by Joseph Smith on his own.

Actually there is evidence, and while it may be little, it is still more than what you have to support the illiterate God theory. Not only do you have zero evidence that God would purposefully send an erroneous transmission to his prophet, you admittedly haven't the foggiest notion as to why that could even be true to begin with. I mean if Prophets are in the business of receiving mis-communications from God and passing them along to canonized scripture, then what good is having a prophet really? I thought that was the whole point that made Mormonism special and unique - being led by prophets who cannot lead the Church astray or preach false doctrine since their communication with God is direct, clear and not polluted. At least that is what I was told to teach while serving my mission.

[Mola Ram Suda Ram]

Well then clearly Green Eggs and Ham must have been written by ancient Hebrews. See:

https://dialoguejournal.com/wp-content/uploads/sbi/articles/Dialogue_V33N04_173.pdf

Best,

Uncertain

This article is about as good as the dirty shirt theory for abiogensis.

[Mola Ram Suda Ram]

This is irrelevant to the fact that the Church has traditionally taught, and continues to teach, that the mysterious language of "Reformed Egyptian" was the language in which the Book of Mormon was originally written.

For some one that pretends to know so much I am amazed that you are capitalizing the word "reformed" in reformed Egyptian".

The script that the Nephites wrote in was a type of Egyptian or a reformed Egyptian. They did not write in a script called "Reformed Egyptian".

[semlogo]

A big problem with this theory is the translation method - Joseph saw words appear in front of his eyes in English, already translated. He wasn't translating in the traditional sense. Also, as others pointed out, the BOM is reformed Egyptian, not Hebrew.

[Fifth Columnist]

I think Mediator and Uncertain have made some very good points, so I will limit my response.

Sort of. Maybe.

We really don't know how this worked.

This is going far beyond what we know or can know, and the phrase "purposefully mistranslated" is tendentious and inflammatory.

Relies on the badly flawed and objectionable (3).

What is the alternative to God and/or his translation department translating the Book of Mormon? Honestly, I've never seen an apologist equivocate about this issue. I can't imagine the if/and apologetic is worthy of jettisoning the idea that God was the ultimate source of the Book of Mormon translation, although you seem to want to have it both ways.

[Uncertain]

If it were truly a "solution," it would have that advantage, yes.

Can you point to the specific passage? I haven't seen it.

Ed Ashment claimed to find several examples in the Doctrine and Covenants, but they weren't, so I'm disinclined to credit claims to have found parallel cases without first examining them myself.

In any case, one isolated example could conceivably be dismissed as the product of scribal error, etc. The series in Helaman 12 cannot plausibly be so explained.

Well I haven't seen it either I based my statement solely on Brant's claim to have identified such an if/and conditional in JS writing. I took him at his word but I suppose he could be mistaken. In any case as I have pointed out the proper comparison is not with edited writings but with unedited dictated writings. Hence the fact even one if/and conditional made it through the editorial process suggests many more may have been present but were removed in proof reading. Similar to what happened with the BOM.

Quite beside the point. I'm aware of modern science and of the nature of statistical evidence. Whereas claims of impersonal and rather mechanical crystal healing are easily subjected to statistical analysis, a very small set of apparent acts by one or more purposive agents (e.g., Joseph Smith, at the least, and a hypothesized ancient author, otherwise unknown, and a hypothesized translating person, otherwise unknown or at best indirectly known) acting for undisclosed aims is far less easily susceptible to such analysis.

In which case claims made on the basis of such evidence that are not subject to rigorous methodologies are much weaker.

The monkeys-at-typewriters gambit isn't especially convincing in this instance. The "if/and" conditional isn't random; it pertains to the very linguistic tradition from which the original text claims to come, yet isn't characteristic (to put things mildly) of the linguistic tradition within which the English text resides.

Which is what random coincidences are. If it did not "pertains to the very linguistic tradition from which the original text claims to come" it would be of no interest whatsoever a random coincidence is a coincidence because it seems connected to some larger picture even though the connection is purely spurious.

And, unless one is prepared to buy the MM/CS reading of Helaman 12, which I see no reason to do, it occurs too many times in a row in that passage to be dismissed as a random grammar mistake. (See above.)

I agree this would rule out random grammar mistakes although not I believe dictation artifacts. It is interesting to me that the passages containing the disputed if/and conditionals in Helaman 12 are all of the same form. Perhaps in dictating passages with very similar form JS just got screwed up with his conditional clauses repeating the same mistake as he dictated very similar passages.

See, also, https://byustudies.byu.edu/showTitle.aspx?title=6872

Yep seen it, this is why I view chiasmus as one of the strongest evidences for BOM historicity.

Best,

Uncertain

[Uncertain]

This article is about as good as the dirty shirt theory for abiogensis.

I do believe you missed the point of the article. The author was attempting to point out Hebracisms can and do occur by random chance. A point the article makes very well.

Best,

Uncertain

[mediator]

Professor Peterson: "...'reformed Egyptian' signifies the script in which that language was written"

Mola Ram Suda Ram: "They did not write in a script called 'Reformed Egyptian.'"

So which is it? And what does it matter if it is capitalized? The characters on the Anthon transcript prove that if this "script" truly existed at all in Ancient America, then it was an entirely different language, apart from Egyptian, meaning it deserves to be capitalized as languages should be. You see, we know what these original Book of Mormon symbols looked like, and they hardly resemble anything remotely similar to Egyptian.

A big problem with this theory is the translation method - Joseph saw words appear in front of his eyes in English, already translated. He wasn't translating in the traditional sense. Also, as others pointed out, the BOM is reformed Egyptian, not Hebrew.

Exactly. Professor Peterson takes refuge in the fact that none of us were there, and so the exact details of every translated word will never be known. However, the fact is we do know some things about the translation process and they cast a huge shadow of doubt over the illiterate God theory. And why didn't these if-and conditionals contaminate the entire work, instead of a tiny fraction of it? Was God playing games with us? And what makes Skousen's generation so special that they get to see this "evidence" discovered in their day? I thought the spiritual confirmation was all that was needed? Since when is God in the business of teasing us with unnecessary evidences in this manner? No, the burden is squarely on the apologists if they want to continue to use this as evidence for the Book of Mormon. I mean, if these arguments are so reasonable and "empirical fact based", then why not present them in a peer-reviewed journal that isn't owned and operated by the LDS Church? This stuff would get laughed at outside BYU.

[Glenn101]

The burden of proof is not on the critic to show a given observation is due to random chance or plausible confounding variables. The burden of proof is on the person making the claim. This is standard procedure in the sciences. Suppose I was trying to show crystal healing worked to do so I gathered affidavits and 5 out of 10 people claimed crystal healing cured their cold. I write up my results and submit to a main stream journal. The editor replies I need to show my results are statistically significant that is are not due to random chance. Do you suppose he would accept an argument that it is up to the editor to prove my results are random and hence my study should be published? Well I can assure you such a response would go over like a lead balloon . Given thousands of grammar mistakes in the BOM and many possible Hebrew linguistic constructs it is a plausible alternative explanation that some few grammar mistakes would resemble Hebrew constructs. Tell me are you prepared to argue Hebracisms never occur by random chance? Well then clearly Green Eggs and Ham must have been written by ancient Hebrews. See:

https://dialoguejournal.com/wp-content/uploads/sbi/articles/Dialogue_V33N04_173.pdf

Best,

Uncertain

Uncertain, have you read that tongue in cheek article with the same level of critical attention you seem to apply to LDS apologetic material?

There are rather obvious errors such as "lo a word meaning no or not". The word "lo" in the Hebrew lexicon means to see or behold. "lo" as a prefix means no or not. But it does not show up in seven of the ten commandments.

The twelve element chiamus Patterson contrived is not a chiasmus. A "twelve part perfect inverse parallelism" where the second twelve elements do not parallel or invert the first six even remotely.

Those are errors that even an untrained eye can catch.

Glenn

[Mola Ram Suda Ram]

I do believe you missed the point of the article. The author was attempting to point out Hebracisms can and do occur by random chance. A point the article makes very well.

Best,

Uncertain

Yes I know what the main thrust was. THere was also some nice mockery going on in there too. To use DCP's words it is amusing.

[Daniel Peterson]

Significance via assertion? I think you missed the point that in order for this to be true, then God must have intended to convey an erroneous translation.

I don't accept the tendentious formulation that this was "an erroneous translation."

When asked to resolve this problem, you claim you haven't the foggiest idea why he would do that and then act like it isn't a problem at all.

I don't think it's a fundamental problem.

I can quite easily believe that somebody did something, or allowed something, without knowing his or her motives for doing so.

You really don't understand how this undermines your claim of "significance"?

That's essentially correct.

Your entire thesis is based on something you admittedly have no explanation for,

Not entirely true. I think it's striking that a Hebrew-like conditional sentence construction appears in a text claiming to have been translated from a Hebrew or Hebrew-like original.

I can't provide you with a proximate reason for that appearance, but I have suggested an ultimate reason for it.

A parallel situation might be this: Suppose that a scholar is combing the Greek of the gospel of Matthew for evidence that that gospel was originally written in Hebrew or Aramaic. She finds what she considers a Semiticism -- that is, an expression that seems to be bad Greek but accords with a known Semitic idiom. She searches high and low for Greek parallels in the koin

[Mola Ram Suda Ram]

So which is it? And what does it matter if it is capitalized? The characters on the Anthon transcript prove that if this "script" truly existed at all in Ancient America, then it was an entirely different language, apart from Egyptian, meaning it deserves to be capitalized as languages should be. You see, we know what these original Book of Mormon symbols looked like, and they hardly resemble anything remotely similar to Egyptian.

I see you are unable to distingish the obvious differences between Reformed Egyptian and reformed Egyptain.

How do you know that what is known as the Anthon Transcipt is inded the same transcript that was shown to Charles Anthon?

BTW if it is reformed Egyptian why would we expect it to look like Egyptian. Is that not the point behind being reformed?

Refomred Egyptian is a proper name. That proper name no where appears in the BoM.

[Daniel Peterson]

This is irrelevant to the fact that the Church has traditionally taught, and continues to teach, that the mysterious language of "Reformed Egyptian" was the language in which the Book of Mormon was originally written. Anyone privy to this knowledge would automatically have reason to question the connection you were trying to make to Hebrew. You can't turn Reformed Egyptian into Hebrew with a wave of the hand, justifying it on the basis of a theory that seems to exist only for the sake of apologetic necessity.

There has never, to the best of my knowledge, been any official Church teaching on the precise linguistic nature of reformed Egyptian, nor even a hint of such a position.

And writers on the Book of Mormon have argued for "reformed Egyptian" as a modified Egyptian script (something like Demotic, I suppose) expressing Hebrew or something like Hebrew for a very, very long time, since decades before the "if/and" conditional was on the horizon. It was scarcely invented out of "apologetic necessity," though I note that, by implicitly charging me and my colleagues with disingenuousness, you're working securely within a prominent, though distinctly uncivil, tradition of your own.

Keep laughing, but the fact is you've written an article suggesting evidence of "divine hints" while responding to the only critical question by throwing your hands up and saying "I haven't the foggiest idea." Makes me wonder which side is really laughing.

It's convenient, I think, that I'm growing less interested in what you have to say at the same time you're growing more insulting. Parting is such sweet sorrow . . .

What you choose to accept here is not based on empirical fact, but rather apologetic convenience.

Uh huh. Name for me some of the places where LDS scholars argue for Hebrew on the plates, and demonstrate, by specific reference, how their arguments dispense with evidence in a quest for "apologetic convenience."

Or else admit that your insinuation of bad faith on our part is baseless, and that you don't actually know the arguments.

Readers should know that the current text would necessarily be twice removed, according to official LDS teaching. The writers were Hebrew but they wrote in Reformed Egyptian, which is not Hebrew.

So you assert.

Clearly, but you provide no reasonable trajectory or coherent argument, other than to throw out some literary anecdotes and expect readers to jump to the same illicit conclusion. They could only do this is they were completely ignorant of the translation process.

Should I take the paragraph immediately above as a specimen of what you regard as reasonable and coherent argument reaching a licit conclusion based on solid knowledge?

If so, I promise to try to keep a straight face.

I guess it derives from the crazy idea that an all knowing deity who is in the business of passing down translations scribbled on rocks, would provide the most accurate translation possible.

In other words, you're trying to deduce historical fact from speculations regarding a theology that you apparently reject.

I have no idea where you're deriving your expectations of an inspired translation being "contaminated."

I have no such expectations. I simply try to account for the data.

[Daniel Peterson]

None of it makes sense really, but it seems to be designed specifically for apologetic purposes.

Third time's the charm.

For example, when the translation is wrong, it is contamination

Nope.

When the translation seems to point to its likely original language, contamination is a highly likely explanation.

and whenever something could possibly resemble something from the ANE, then it is proof of divine inspiration.

Evidence, not proof.

Caricaturing my position and my approach may gratify you in some way, but it's not particularly helpful to good conversation.

I guess this apologetic vehicle could get a lot of mileage with defending the Book of Abraham.

I take it that you're hostile to Mormon claims across the board. This isn't surprising, but it scarcely seems relevant.

And yet you feel comfortable writing apologetic articles while asserting a language contamination in a translation which you now admit knowing nothing about?

I don't admit to knowing nothing about it.

Why misrepresent what I say?

But you seem unwilling or uninterested in entertaining other ideas that would explain this phenomena.

Phenomenon. Singular.

I'm perfectly willing to entertain other ideas. They need to be persuasive, though, or, after a while, I'll stop entertaining them.

Instead, you misrepresent the critics for trying to "get rid" of it altogether. Do you do this to make your apologetic seem stronger than it really is?

I don't do this. Not for any purpose.

Did you type this with a straight face? Your conclusion is entirely speculative. No one takes issue with the facts you presented, only the conclusion you arrived to.

At would be more idiomatic, I think. Arrived at.

Yes, I typed it with a straight face. I mean what I said.

Actually there is evidence, and while it may be little, it is still more than what you have to support the illiterate God theory.

The "illiterate God theory"?

LOL. You're really not serious, I see. Caricature upon caricature. I think I'll assume, from now on, that you're not really interested in interacting with me but only without your cartoon of me.

Not only do you have zero evidence that God would purposefully send an erroneous transmission to his prophet, you admittedly haven't the foggiest notion as to why that could even be true to begin with.

I don't need to know why a person has done something in order to be convinced, or at least quite confident, that she has done it.

I mean if Prophets are in the business of receiving mis-communications from God and passing them along to canonized scripture, then what good is having a prophet really? I thought that was the whole point that made Mormonism special and unique - being led by prophets who cannot lead the Church astray or preach false doctrine since their communication with God is direct, clear and not polluted. At least that is what I was told to teach while serving my mission.

Right. And you think that an "if/and" conditional sentence or an inessential grammatical error renders any communication from God utterly worthless, makes it "false doctrine," leads the Church astray? If there were a fire in a crowded theater, and the exits were marked with signs on which one of the lights had gone out so that they read Ex t instead of Exit, would you remain in your seat, muttering angrily that there was no point to having exits at all?

[Daniel Peterson]

A big problem with this theory is the translation method - Joseph saw words appear in front of his eyes in English, already translated.

A problem for which theory?

Not mine.

He wasn't translating in the traditional sense.

Quite so.

Also, as others pointed out, the BOM is reformed Egyptian, not Hebrew.

And what, exactly, is "reformed Egyptian"? Do we have any authoritative linguistic pronouncements on it from the Church? I've never seen any, and I would have been very eager to read them.

For those who might be interested, there is a listing of articles on the nature of "reformed Egyptian" at

http://maxwellinstitute.byu.edu/search/?fulltext=reformed+Egyptian&search=Go

Those who aren't interested need not trouble themselves to look.

[Zakuska]

I think Mediator and Uncertain have made some very good points, so I will limit my response.

What is the alternative to God and/or his translation department translating the Book of Mormon? Honestly, I've never seen an apologist equivocate about this issue. I can't imagine the if/and apologetic is worthy of jettisoning the idea that God was the ultimate source of the Book of Mormon translation, although you seem to want to have it both ways.

IMHO, Critics are the ones who want it both ways.

It all comes down to, what exaclty is ment by... "translated by the gift and power of God"?

Critics seem to think this should be defined as... 100% error free. As if God took possesion of Joseph Smith and his scribes bodies and so as they were writing... through long hours of the day and nights many times by candle light... their work was 100 % error free. 100% as if God was writing every letter.

The data does not support it.

Yet the critics still cling to this straw man definition.

As evidenced in Mediators post to Dr. Petersen:

I mean if Prophets are in the business of receiving mis-communications from God and passing them along to canonized scripture, then what good is having a prophet really? I thought that was the whole point that made Mormonism special and unique - being led by prophets who cannot lead the Church astray or preach false doctrine since their communication with God is direct, clear and not polluted. At least that is what I was told to teach while serving my mission.

Paul specifically says many of his writings didn't come from God. Yet they ended up as cannonized scripture.

[Joseph Antley]

For what it's worth -- don't if/and conditions also appear in Egyptian? Maybe I'm misremembering.

[Daniel Peterson]

In which case claims made on the basis of such evidence that are not subject to rigorous methodologies are much weaker.

Maybe. Maybe not.

I'm inclined to resist notions that physics and chemistry, because they're quantifiable, are legitimate ways of knowing, while history, which resists quantification, is not -- or, anyway, is less legitimate.

Which is what random coincidences are.

Unless you misspoke, you seem to be operating on the basis of an extraordinarily weird definition of "random coincidence."

If it did not "pertains to the very linguistic tradition from which the original text claims to come" it would be of no interest whatsoever

Obviously.

a random coincidence is a coincidence because it seems connected to some larger picture even though the connection is purely spurious.

Obviously.

But, of course, this hasn't been established with regard to the "if/and" conditionals in the Book of Mormon, though it has been asserted with some vigor.

I agree this would rule out random grammar mistakes although not I believe dictation artifacts. It is interesting to me that the passages containing the disputed if/and conditionals in Helaman 12 are all of the same form. Perhaps in dictating passages with very similar form JS just got screwed up with his conditional clauses repeating the same mistake as he dictated very similar passages.

Perhaps.

I'm unpersuaded, though.

[mfbukowski]

This is irrelevant to the fact that the Church has traditionally taught, and continues to teach, that the mysterious language of "Reformed Egyptian" was the language in which the Book of Mormon was originally written.

Just plain incorrect. The BOM itself states that it was written in Hebrew using the characters of Reformed Egyptian. Any statements that it was written in "Reformed Egyptian" are understood that way as a kind of short hand rather than saying "written in Reformed Egyptian text", but that is the meaning.

I guess it derives from the crazy idea that an all knowing deity who is in the business of passing down translations scribbled on rocks, would provide the most accurate translation possible. I have no idea where you're deriving your expectations of an inspired translation being "contaminated." None of it makes sense really, but it seems to be designed specifically for apologetic purposes. For example, when the translation is wrong, it is contamination and whenever something could possibly resemble something from the ANE, then it is proof of divine inspiration. I guess this apologetic vehicle could get a lot of mileage with defending the Book of Abraham.

Your approach is seriously flawed by the usual fundamentalism displayed by critics who have no understanding of revelation or "inspiration" whatsoever. Revelation, like intuition, and inspiration is the receipt of information in the mind, the source of which the recipient feels was not internal to himself.

Artists often speak of poems or musical pieces or other art works being "given" to them as it were "out of the air". Beethoven and Michalangelo, among many others, speak of this phenomenon.

Sometimes the revelation comes as a concept left unexpressed to be phrased by the recipient, sometime specific words are given, sometimes it is a combination of both. In my opinion what was happening here is that Joseph was receiving "Hebraic thought patterns" which he then spoke using his own words.

I thought that was the whole point that made Mormonism special and unique - being led by prophets who cannot lead the Church astray or preach false doctrine since their communication with God is direct, clear and not polluted. At least that is what I was told to teach while serving my mission.

You misunderstood. We are always to gain our own testimonies of each principle. A living God is a teacher- and a good teacher can teach the same principles many different ways. There are more than one way to do long division, and the way you teach it depends on the student's understanding and ability.

Your comments themselves make this apparent.

[mfbukowski]

A big problem with this theory is the translation method - Joseph saw words appear in front of his eyes in English, already translated.

Only sometimes. There were other methods employed as well.

[Glenn101]

IMHO, Critics are the ones who want it both ways.

It all comes down to, what exaclty is ment by... "translated by the gift and power of God"?

Critics seem to think this should be defined as... 100% error free. As if God took possesion of Joseph Smith and his scribes bodies and so as they were writing... through long hours of the day and nights many times by candle light... their work was 100 % error free. 100% as if God was writing every letter.

The data does not support it.

Yet the critics still cling to this straw man definition.

This whole thread is irrelevant. Joseph Smith was a programmer, as in computers. The if/and conditionals are used extensively in several different types of computer programming languages. Next topic?

Glenn

[mfbukowski]

Exactly. Professor Peterson takes refuge in the fact that none of us were there, and so the exact details of every translated word will never be known. However, the fact is we do know some things about the translation process and they cast a huge shadow of doubt over the illiterate God theory. And why didn't these if-and conditionals contaminate the entire work, instead of a tiny fraction of it? Was God playing games with us?

This is precisely the kind of fundamentalistic thinking we find very common among critics.

[Calm]

Found an article about reformed Egyptian as the script with the language actually being Hebrew written as early as 71 in the Ensign (could have been New Era as there was another article I read there). Since that is pretty much as early as the online version can go, it is possible that there was earlier mention of this concept in church published literature.

[Fifth Columnist]

I don't accept the tendentious formulation that this was "an erroneous translation."

In what sense are the if/and conditionals not erroneous? Because they were translated that way on purpose, or because if/and conditionals are not an erroneous way to translate Hebrew into English, or some other reason?

[Calm]

From the Institute BoM manual:

In Mormon 9:32