The Fair Journal

[Benjamin McGuire]

First, Isaiah 29 isn't quoted as a single piece in 2 Nephi 27.

From verse 6 to the end it is.

No it isn't. There are two reasons why this reasoning of yours is bad. First the simple one. The quoting of Isaiah 29 starts in 2 Nephi 26:15. Now, the chapters (as I note) are not original. This was a unified body of text before it was broken up. In any text, we can always make this claim when it quotes it (i.e. the rest of it is quoted in a single block) but that ignores substantially the fact the the first part is not.

The second issue is that the text of Isaiah is modified - presumably as Nephi likens it unto himself. It is modified in the section that claim is quoted as a single piece (which means that it isn't quoted - it is a reinscription). So for example, from 26:15 we get this comparison:

Isaiah: And I will camp against thee round about, and will lay siege against thee with a mount, and I will raise forts against thee.

And this from Nephi: yea, after the Lord God shall have camped against them round about, and shall have laid siege against them with a mount, and raised forts against them;

So we move to 2 Nephi 27, and we see this occurring throughout the text (and this is significantly different from the Isaiah chapters that are largely quoted verbatim elsewhere). Comparing 2 N 27:3 to I 29:6

And when that day shall come they shall be visited of the Lord of Hosts, with thunder and with earthquake, and with a great noise, and with storm, and with tempest, and with the flame of devouring fire.

Thou shalt be visited of the Lord of hosts with thunder, and with earthquake, and great noise, with storm and tempest, and the flame of devouring afire.

And this is pretty close still. But when we get more specifics that are unrelated to Nephi's likening unto himself in the next verses, we see some significant changes:

And all the nations that fight against Zion, and that distress her, shall be as a dream of a night vision;

Compared with this:

And the multitude of all the nations that fight against Ariel, even all that fight against her and her munition, and that distress her, shall be as a dream of a night vision.

This is not quoting Isaiah. This is using Isaiah. But guess what happens - it is here that we get the big insertion. Your point is trying to prove that the insertion reads as if it were part of that solid block. But its not. Isaiah 29:6 gets used in 2 Nephi 27:1 - but, as you point out, verses 11 and 12 of Isaiah 29 expand into many more verses in 2 Nephi 27. This is not a block quote. Nephi is clearly interspersing the Isaiah material with his own.

The chapter breaks aren’t helpful eh? Well, let’s see... Nephi quotes Isaiah 29 to the end of the KJV chapter then stops. The 2 Nephi 27/28 chapter break in the printer’s manuscript, 1830 edition and modern edition coincides with the Isaiah 29/30 chapter break in the KJV Bible. Furthermore, Nephi copies the KJV mistranslation, “offender for a word”, in verse 32. How did Nephi get a KJV Bible?

And now we get the non-sequitor argument that has no value here. Nephi does quote Isaiah 29 to the end (the chapter breaks in Isaiah are pretty old, don't you think?). But, Nephi doesn't start quoting Isaiah 29 in chapter 27, he starts it in chapter 26. There isn't much you can do to get around this. And of course, I attribute the actual use of the King James Version to the translation process (or whatever process it was) that produced the modern text. It clearly relied on the KJV. But, 2 Nephi 27 doesn't really quote Isaiah 29 for much of the chapter, and 2 Nephi 26-27 inserts material into the Isaiah text in several places while often also altering that Isaiah text.

That’s because they’re clearly addressed to Jerusalem. It was simply beyond Joseph Smith's translating powers to turn “Woe to Ariel, to Ariel, the city where David dwelt!” into a prophecy about Charles Anthon.

And as you point out, they wouldn't have been relevant to Nephi's prophecy either (which is why the additional reference in verse 7 is taken out).

2 Nephi 27 constitutes a single literary unit. After providing an introduction in verse 1, the authors works his way through Isaiah 29 until he hits the end of the KJV chapter. The fact that other verses are quoted elsewhere is irrelevant.

No, it doesn't constitute a single literary unit. The beginning of this narrative unit occurs in 26:14. That verse reads:

"But behold, I prophesy unto you concerning the last days; concerning the days when the Lord God shall being these things forth unto the children of men." That prophecy in part constitutes all of chapter 27. You yourself admit that this is the case. The transition to the next literary unit occurs in 28:1 - which reads: "And now, behold, my brethren, I have spoken unto you, according as the Spirit hath constrained me; wherefore, I know that they must surely come to pass." This seems pretty straight forward. We have a statement marking the beginning of the prophecy, and statement of testimony marking the end of it. Everything in between is what Nephi "spoke" as part of that prophecy. What you call the introduction in 27:1 seems to be part and parcel of that prophecy.

Now when you say that the other verses being quoted is irrelevant is a much bigger problem. Those verses are quoted within the scope of the narrative unit that I identify - and more importantly they are presented in order. They are not somehow taken out of sequence. It is as if the author of 2 Nephi 26-27 intended to use most of chapter 29 of Isaiah and did so, interspersing commentary. And in fact, if individuals were to read from a first edition Book of Mormon without the chapter break at the beginning of Chapter 27 (which you keep insisting has no real significance) I don't believe for a moment that most of them would place the chapter break as a natural textual limiter. You have split a prophecy in two. Both parts quote from Isaiah. They quote from it in the order that the material appears in Isaiah. The only you would have to assert that it is distinct is that it does so much damage to your hypothesis.

This is driven by nothing but apologetic necessity. If Joseph Smith were here posting on this board today, he would tell you that the words are all Isaiah’s. And he wouldn’t be happy about you throwing his JST under the bus.

Nonsense. And I disagree with your assessment of Joseph Smith. I think that you have boarded an ideological train, and are happy to find evidences of that - even when those evidences are clearly superficial and badly flawed. Isn't that the ad hominem I started with? More on that in a moment (and by the way, I do want to point out that your claims here, that my suggestion is driven purely by apologetic necessity is itself a ad hominem argument - so while you essay may be free of it, you do seem to be more than willing to engage in it).

Do you think it’s more likely in the next General Conference that Pres. Monson will tell us what we need to know today or that he will prophecy about the coming forth of the Sealed Portion 2380 years from now, thousands of miles away, including all the gory details about how learned/unlearned the various actors will be, who will deliver the book to whom, what everybody will say etc., etc., etc.,? Furthermore, do you think it would help his prophecy if he based it on a gross misinterpretation of a Bible passage?

Now, this may be your ideological point of view, but, it has very little to do with the issue here. This is a discussion about texts and about how texts work. This is not a discussion about prophecy or how prophecy works. This kind of aside is merely a distraction.

A second thing is that as far as I can tell, you are an incompetent reader of the Bible. You don't have significant background in Isaiah. You don't have significant background in Near Eastern studies. Clearly, the New Testament abuses the Old Testament all the time. I am not sure that argument has much merit. On the other side of the coin, we don't usually try to interpret texts based on these kinds of issues (that touches on the subject of the intentional fallacy). We don't have understand why a Nephi might have grossly misinterpreted a passage of the Bible to understand that he did use that passage. This is where there is a significant disconnect to your argument. The fact that you (and I have to admit that your ideological position doesn't give me a lot of faith in your interpretative powers here) don't understand why Nephi might have done something doesn't make an argument that he in fact did something else.

Wrong.

You could have fooled the rest of us Andrew. Because there is absolutely nothing in your essays to suggest that had even considered the options that I raise. You don't mention that Isaiah 29 is quoted in 2 Nephi 26. You probably didn't notice (there's that header issue again). So assert it all you like, it won't change my perception. I don't think you read 2 Nephi 26 in connection with this issue (at least not until I pointed this out).

You seem obsessed with the header. I’m not.

That's right. You are obsessed with your ideology.

Now I understand that you will still assign all of this to Joseph, as you don't have any real belief that the Book of Mormon represents some kind of historical work, but you have to understand from my perspective, this is all a polemical ploy. What you want to try and do is to confront LDS members with some kind of paradox. Your argument though falls completely flat because you didn't take the time to understand the LDS position on the text, and you didn't take the time to look at the implications of your claims. You are far too focused on the (in your mind) absurdity of someone actually receiving a revelation from God.

Ben M.

[Mortal Man]

While it is true that chiasmus can appear accidentally or unintentionally (at least at the subconscious level), it is a matter of strong consensus among biblical scholars that chiasmus can be deliberately employed -- as can a number of other rhetorical or literary structures -- by a great maestro in the midst of composition.

I never said that chiasmus could not be deliberate. In my statement that you bolded I acknowledged deliberate chiasmus in the Bible.

Jack Welch has shown in detail and with a plethora of examples that this is certainly true of the Book of Mormon.

And of the D&C and various works by Dr. Seuss.

In his latest book, David P. Wright argues that, although "scholars must be more circumspect in the analysis of chiastic structures. . . . I now recognize that the structure in [Exodus] 23:1-8 and its derivation from a similar structure in LH [Laws of Hammurabi] is one of the most solid proofs of the intentional formation of chiasmus in antiquity" (Wright, Inventing God's Law: How the Covenant Code of the Bible Used and Revised the Laws of Hammurabi [Oxford Univ. Press, 2009], 378 n.15). Wright says that "Exodus 23;1-8 exhibits a chiastic structure that must be judged to have been intentionally crafted in view of its complexity and tightness, as well as in its extension by the two strings of the final apodictic laws" (64).

Ahhhh... I love to see apologists quote David Wright; it gives me warm fuzzies inside.

Wright's late teacher, Jacob Milgrom, published a massive three-volume translation-commentary on the book of Leviticus for the Anchor Bible (Doubleday, 1991-2000) in which virtually every chapter contains detailed diagrams and extensive discussion of the profusion of chiasms which he found therein. Based on that detailed analysis, Milgrom was able to say that the Holiness (H) Code tradition was "more artful and intricate [than P] in its use" of chiasmus (I:39). Milgrom also maintained that "chiastic arrangement" "aids significantly in . . . exegesis" of texts (I:683-684). Indeed, Milgrom concluded from the chiasm of Leviticus 18 - 20, with chapter 19 at the center, "may well be the intended climactic center for the book of Leviticus and even for the Torah as a whole" (II:1320). He likewise finds that the introversion at Lev 24:13-23 is "a major summit of H's structural artistry" -- with the Lex Talionis at center (II:1321). He concludes that "H's aesthetic arrangement of the text [Lev 26:3-12] may primarily have a kerygmatic goal. Hence structure is theology" (II:1322).

This reminds me of a song.

For some of us mortal men, this is serious business, not merely a game.

Here's a little "game" to help us understand why some apologists are so good at chiasmus.

Circular logic invariably

generates chiasmus,

therefore chiasmus

is the natural result of circular logic.

[Mola Ram Suda Ram]

Circular logic invariably

generates chiasmus,

therefore chiasmus

is the natural result of circular logic.

Hopefully you deal with Ben's response with more substance than this post.

[Mortal Man]

What you write is clearly polemical.

Alas, the truth is polemical to some people. I can only do so much to shield you from it.

And, I don't mind throwing in an occasional ad hominem attack. I think that you deserve it.

That’s very thoughtful of you Ben. I wouldn’t want to get anything less than what you think I deserve.

You like to use a lot of scholarly lingo

I’m sorry, I’ll try to stick with unscholarly lingo in the future.

I thought I made a pretty good evidentiary argument to back up my point.

You’ve made a reasonable argument that the author of 2 Nephi 26 & 27 plagiarized Isaiah 29, except for the first two verses, which have too many Ariels in them to be of use. The problem is that the author starts his train of thought in 26:15 but after only 4 verses gets completely derailed. He jumps here and there all over the Bible, even quoting the Ten Commandments in verse 32, and finally lands at the bottom of a cliff by verse 33. At this point there’s nothing to do but start all over again from scratch. Had the author not been raised on the rambling free-ranging style of revivalist preachers, he might not have gone so far off course. You've yet to make a single argument for Nephi that would not better apply to Joseph. Who would have been more likely to misinterpret Isaiah's commentary on Jerusalem, a man raised in Jerusalem ~150 years after the fact or a man raised on another continent ~2500 years after the fact?

For those of you who missed it, Andrew was trying to be clever when he provided us with this:

A I came to this conclusion

B when I discovered it in my own writing completely by accident.

B' I was writing a technical paper (nothing to do with religion)

A' when it suddenly hit me that the paragraph I had just written was a perfect ABCCBA chiasmus.

LOL! That was completely unintentional. But after I wrote it, I thought to myself, “it would be pretty funny to turn that into a chiasmus.” But then I thought, “naw, Ben is mad enough as it is,” so left it like it was.

...And I am telling you that by comparing your own understanding of chiasmus (at least as you present it) to that of the LDS apologists have have written a great deal on the subject, you are erecting a straw man that you then knock down with abandon...

All this chiasmus stuff really belongs in another thread.

My brief comments on chiasmus in that essay were merely introductory.

They weren’t intended to constitute an exhaustive study of the subject.

Nor was I addressing a specialized audience.

I was addressing a general audience.

I only intended to list a few important considerations relating to the topic.

In order to motivate the discussion of if/and conditionals, which form the heart of the essay.

We can discuss those in another thread.

[Robert F. Smith]

Mortal Man, on 11 May 2011 - 10:41 PM, said:

You are attempting to define chiasmus as a deliberate rhetorical form in order to force your point, but the fact remains that the inverted parallelism of which you speak does indeed occur naturally and unintentionally in both poetry and prose. I came to this conclusion when I discovered it in my own writing completely by accident. I was writing a technical paper (nothing to do with religion) when it suddenly hit me that the paragraph I had just written was a perfect ABCCBA chiasmus. It was both poetic and completely unintentional. This is my testimony of chiasmus.

I’m simply stating that there are no deliberate chiasmi in the BoM, other than the ones transported from the KJV. It’s the apologists who are playing “Find the Chiasmus!” as if the BoM were Where’s Waldo?.

I never said that chiasmus could not be deliberate. In my statement that you bolded I acknowledged deliberate chiasmus in the Bible.

I understood what you were saying very well. In fact, I was agreeing with you that chiasmus could be both accidental and deliberate. Since you believe that there is some deliberate chiasmus in the Bible, I followed up with an attempt to show how scholars describe intentional chiasms in the Bible. That is why I chose to quote both David Wright and his late mentor on the nature of deliberate chiasmus. I thought you might appreciate that with something more substantive than just "warm fuzzies." However, all I got for my trouble was parody and a generous helping of circularity.

Ahhhh... I love to see apologists quote David Wright; it gives me warm fuzzies inside.

This reminds me of a song.

Here's a little "game" to help us understand why some apologists are so good at chiasmus.

Circular logic invariably

generates chiasmus,

therefore chiasmus

is the natural result of circular logic.

The issue at hand, as you well know, is whether accidental and deliberate chiasms can be distinguished from one another. Biblical scholars (at least one of whom gives you the warm fuzzies) claim to be able to do just that -- and you claim to agree that biblical chiasms can be deliberate, but simultaneously claim that such is not the case for the Book of Mormon. On what basis?

DId you apply the standard criteria carefully laid out by Jack Welch here? If your only basis for rejecting chiasmus in the Book of Mormon is polemic, you need to own up to that sad fact.

[volgadon]

Who would have been more likely to misinterpret Isaiah's commentary on Jerusalem, a man raised in Jerusalem ~150 years after the fact or a man raised on another continent ~2500 years after the fact?

Both, as seen by that quote I provided.

[Mortal Man]

The quoting of Isaiah 29 starts in 2 Nephi 26:15.

Actually, it starts in 25:17.

Now, the chapters (as I note) are not original. This was a unified body of text before it was broken up.

I think you misunderstood my earlier comment about the chapter breaks. The modern BoM chapter breaks are irrelevant. What is relevant is the fact that chapter XI in the 1830 edition matches up with chapter 29 of Isaiah. The KJV chapter breaks did not exist in Isaiah until Archbishop Stephen Langton put them there in the 13^th century. The most that could have existed on the Brass Plates, were setumah or petuhah demarcating much shorter text units. For Nephi to begin (except for the Ariel verses) and end on the breaks corresponding to Langton’s divisions is a stunning coincidence.

The second issue is that the text of Isaiah is modified - presumably as Nephi likens it unto himself. It is modified in the section that claim is quoted as a single piece (which means that it isn't quoted - it is a reinscription). So for example, from 26:15 we get this comparison:

Isaiah: And I will camp against thee round about, and will lay siege against thee with a mount, and I will raise forts against thee.

And this from Nephi: yea, after the Lord God shall have camped against them round about, and shall have laid siege against them with a mount, and raised forts against them;

So we move to 2 Nephi 27, and we see this occurring throughout the text (and this is significantly different from the Isaiah chapters that are largely quoted verbatim elsewhere). Comparing 2 N 27:3 to I 29:6

And when that day shall come they shall be visited of the Lord of Hosts, with thunder and with earthquake, and with a great noise, and with storm, and with tempest, and with the flame of devouring fire.

Thou shalt be visited of the Lord of hosts with thunder, and with earthquake, and great noise, with storm and tempest, and the flame of devouring afire.

For the purpose of moving this discussion along, let’s assume for the moment that Joseph Smith and Bruce R. McConkie were wrong and that 2 Nephi 27 was not copied off the Brass Plates but rather is Nephi’s midrash. Please explain to us whether Nephi interpreted Isaiah 29 correctly; if so, how; if not, why not?

And this is pretty close still. But when we get more specifics that are unrelated to Nephi's likening unto himself in the next verses, we see some significant changes:

And all the nations that fight against Zion, and that distress her, shall be as a dream of a night vision;

Compared with this:

And the multitude of all the nations that fight against Ariel, even all that fight against her and her munition, and that distress her, shall be as a dream of a night vision.

Since you and Robert have both pointed out this difference, let’s take a look at “Zion” vs. “Ariel”. It’s pretty clear that the author of 2 Nephi 27 was averse to “Ariel” since he skips 4 instances of it in Isaiah 29:1-2 and changes it in verse 7.

“Ariel” is a Hebrew name, which, through its connection with Ezekiel 43, appears to suggest that Jerusalem is going to burn. Nephi would have been very familiar with this name for his home town, just as New Yorkers are familiar with “The Big Apple”.

“Zion” on the other hand, is probably not a Hebrew word. Nephi would have understood it to mean “Mount Zion” (Isaiah 29:8 ); i.e., a specific place in Jerusalem. Joseph Smith however, used “Zion” in much broader terms; i.e., the gathering place of the saints, which is how the word is used in 2 Nephi 27:3.

(the chapter breaks in Isaiah are pretty old, don't you think?)

I have no idea what this means.

And of course, I attribute the actual use of the King James Version to the translation process (or whatever process it was) that produced the modern text. It clearly relied on the KJV.

I heartily agree, but let me just note that this puts you directly at odds with DCP and the majority of BoM apologists.

The transition to the next literary unit occurs in 28:1 - which reads: "And now, behold, my brethren, I have spoken unto you, according as the Spirit hath constrained me; wherefore, I know that they must surely come to pass."

Doesn’t it strike you as odd that, after quoting 12 straight verses virtually verbatim from KJV-Isaiah 29, Nephi declares, “I have spoken unto you”?

Now when you say that the other verses being quoted is irrelevant is a much bigger problem. Those verses are quoted within the scope of the narrative unit that I identify - and more importantly they are presented in order. They are not somehow taken out of sequence.

“Marvelous work and a wonder” (25:17) is out of sequence.

It is as if the author of 2 Nephi 26-27 intended to use most of chapter 29 of Isaiah and did so, interspersing commentary.

I absolutely agree.

This is a discussion about texts and about how texts work. This is not a discussion about prophecy or how prophecy works.

You can’t understand the latter until you understand the former.

you are an incompetent reader of the Bible…

Is this really necessary?

We don't have understand why a Nephi might have grossly misinterpreted a passage of the Bible to understand that he did use that passage.

Oh really? How exactly can we understand this?

Now I understand that you will still assign all of this to Joseph, as you don't have any real belief that the Book of Mormon represents some kind of historical work, but you have to understand from my perspective, this is all a polemical ploy.

I will simply point out that you’ve got the cause and effect mixed up. My arguments are not driven by a lack of belief but vice versa.

you didn't take the time to understand the LDS position on the text, and you didn't take the time to look at the implications of your claims.

The LDS position is that Nephi quoted off the Brass Plates and that the JST was necessary “to restore truths to the Bible text that had become lost or changed since the original words were written” and to recover “certain truths that the original authors had once recorded” (those statements appeared on the official LDS website until shortly after I first posted my essay on MADB).

You are far too focused on the (in your mind) absurdity of someone actually receiving a revelation from God.

I’m very open to this possibility, in fact, I long for it. But I also reserve the right to question it. It feels so good not to be trammeled.

[Mortal Man]

duplicate

[Mortal Man]

The issue at hand, as you well know, is whether accidental and deliberate chiasms can be distinguished from one another.

Unless you're the author, there's now way to know for certain.

Biblical scholars (at least one of whom gives you the warm fuzzies) claim to be able to do just that --

I claim that biblical scholars get warm fuzzies too.

and you claim to agree that biblical chiasms can be deliberate,

I simply agree, no claiming necessary.

but simultaneously claim that such is not the case for the Book of Mormon.

There's nothing in the BoM that was clearly deliberate.

On what basis?

On the basis that the BoM chasmi are no different than the D&C chiasmi in any quantifiable ways.

DId you apply the standard criteria carefully laid out by Jack Welch here?

I applied his conclusion:

Most aesthetic forms of literature and art do not lend themselves easily to formulaic definition or complete description, and the chiastic form is no exception. Thus it is not imagined that these proposed criteria will convert the study of chiasmus into a science.

If your only basis for rejecting chiasmus in the Book of Mormon is polemic, you need to own up to that sad fact.

I never rejected chiasmus in the Book of Mormon; I explicitly stated it's presence. I only rejected Ben's narrow definition of chiasmus as always deliberate.

[Mortal Man]

Both, as seen by that quote I provided.

That this paradox not always perceived is a measure of the scribes’ success in subordinating their voice to that of the tradition. Even more paradoxically, in the end it is their interpretations that have become the received tradition; their oral traditions are the written text given to the community.

Would this be one of Ben's false paradoxes?

[Mortal Man]

you didn't take the time to look at the implications of your claims.

I suggest you and Robert take the time to look at the implications of your claim that JST-Isaiah 29:11-26 is a mistake.

Does this mean that the Book of Moses and Joseph Smith-Matthew are mistakes?

It appears I'm not the only uncorrelated Mormon around here.

[Robert F. Smith]

I suggest you and Robert take the time to look at the implications of your claim that JST-Isaiah 29:11-26 is a mistake.

Does this mean that the Book of Moses and Joseph Smith-Matthew are mistakes?

It appears I'm not the only uncorrelated Mormon around here.

You blithely ignored my comments on the "JST" work of Sidney Rigdon and Joseph Smith (using an 1828 Phinney Bible purchased at the Grandin Bookstore by Oliver Cowdery): The nature of the so-called "JST" work of these two compatriots runs from revelatory (presumably including the Book of Moses) to mere improvements in text written into the margin of the Phinney Bible -- sometimes involving no more than one word. Only where it is part of the official Canon is it of sufficient gravity to be given real attention.

I did not "claim that JST-Isaiah 29:11-16 is a mistake," and I'm not sure that anyone else did either. I am not sure why you would make that false claim, unless it serves some polemic purpose -- such as setting up a straw man. Since that part of the JST is non-canonical, it simply has no official standing. Why do you insist on giving non-canonical writings such importance?

[Robert F. Smith]

There's nothing in the BoM that was clearly deliberate.

On the basis that the BoM chasmi are no different than the D&C chiasmi in any quantifiable ways.

I am supposing that you meant to say what you have said repeatedly, that you do not believe that there are any deliberate chiasms in the Book of Mormon.

Having made a detailed analysis years ago of suggested D&C chiasms, I can say with certainty that you are incorrect to say that they are not different from Book of Mormon chiasms "in any quantifiable ways." Moreover, you give no indication of having made a serious effort to do such an analysis of your own following standard criteria -- such as those adopted by Jack Welch from the larger non-Mormon community of scholars.

I applied his conclusion:

I never rejected chiasmus in the Book of Mormon; I explicitly stated it's presence. I only rejected Ben's narrow definition of chiasmus as always deliberate.

You applied Welch's conclusion without bothering to apply the diagnostic criteria of Wright, Milgrom, Welch, or any other of the host of scholars who have been doing these analyses for decades.

Perhaps you should recuse yourself and submit the question to a disinterested third party.

[Robert F. Smith]

Benjamin McGuire, on 12 May 2011 - 07:42 AM, said:

The quoting of Isaiah 29 starts in 2 Nephi 26:15.

Mortal Man: Actually, it starts in 25:17.

So much the better and more convincing the case for the midrashic commentary of Nephi on Isaiah 29.

McGuire quote:

Now, the chapters (as I note) are not original. This was a unified body of text before it was broken up.

Mortal Man: I think you misunderstood my earlier comment about the chapter breaks. The modern BoM chapter breaks are irrelevant. What is relevant is the fact that chapter XI in the 1830 edition matches up with chapter 29 of Isaiah. The KJV chapter breaks did not exist in Isaiah until Archbishop Stephen Langton put them there in the 13^th century. The most that could have existed on the Brass Plates, were setumah or petuhah demarcating much shorter text units. For Nephi to begin (except for the Ariel verses) and end on the breaks corresponding to Langton’s divisions is a stunning coincidence.

Misleading. Chapter XI does not match up with chapter 29 of Isaiah, although it does contain extensive commentary by Nephi on Isaiah 29.

Chapter XI in the Printer's MS and in the 1830 Book of Mormon is equivalent to modern LDS chapters 25-27. Chapter XII begins at modern LDS chapter 28. We don't know what the Original MS may have had on chapter numbers in these cases, but it is worth noting that the direct quotations up through Isaiah 14 end just as chapter XI (LDS 25) begins -- which would certainly be appropriate to the beginning of Nephi's midrashic commentary on Isaiah 29.

Moreover, although column XXIII, line 6, of the Great Isaiah Scroll from Qumran Cave 1 ends with the last word of Isaiah 28 (BHS has a setuma sign inserted), and line 7 begins chapter 29, that does not tell us what sort of line, paragraph, and chapter divisions may have existed in the Egyptian text on the Bronze Plates. However, the so-called "Anthon Transcript" (the horizontal one) in the RLDS Archives-Museum does have various division points reminiscent of those used in hieratic Egyptian, even though the text appears to the undiscriminating to be continuous and undifferentiated.

Thank you, by the way, for inserting that link, Mortal Man. I was not previously aware of it, although I have visited the Shrine of the Book in Jerusalem more than once.

McGuire Quote:

The second issue is that the text of Isaiah is modified - presumably as Nephi likens it unto himself. It is modified in the section that claim is quoted as a single piece (which means that it isn't quoted - it is a reinscription). So for example, from 26:15 we get this comparison:

Isaiah: And I will camp against thee round about, and will lay siege against thee with a mount, and I will raise forts against thee.

And this from Nephi: yea, after the Lord God shall have camped against them round about, and shall have laid siege against them with a mount, and raised forts against them;

So we move to 2 Nephi 27, and we see this occurring throughout the text (and this is significantly different from the Isaiah chapters that are largely quoted verbatim elsewhere). Comparing 2 N 27:3 to I 29:6

And when that day shall come they shall be visited of the Lord of Hosts, with thunder and with earthquake, and with a great noise, and with storm, and with tempest, and with the flame of devouring fire.

Thou shalt be visited of the Lord of hosts with thunder, and with earthquake, and great noise, with storm and tempest, and the flame of devouring afire.

Mortal Man: For the purpose of moving this discussion along, let’s assume for the moment that Joseph Smith and Bruce R. McConkie were wrong and that 2 Nephi 27 was not copied off the Brass Plates but rather is Nephi’s midrash. Please explain to us whether Nephi interpreted Isaiah 29 correctly; if so, how; if not, why not?

CFR Mortal Man. Where do Joseph and Bruce claim that II Nephi 27 was copied directly from the "Brass" Plates, rather than from the Book of Mormon plates? Where do they claim that chapter 27 was not commentary?

McGuire Quote:

And this is pretty close still. But when we get more specifics that are unrelated to Nephi's likening unto himself in the next verses, we see some significant changes:

And all the nations that fight against Zion, and that distress her, shall be as a dream of a night vision;

Compared with this:

And the multitude of all the nations that fight against Ariel, even all that fight against her and her munition, and that distress her, shall be as a dream of a night vision.

Mortal Man: Since you and Robert have both pointed out this difference, let’s take a look at “Zion” vs. “Ariel”. It’s pretty clear that the author of 2 Nephi 27 was averse to “Ariel” since he skips 4 instances of it in Isaiah 29:1-2 and changes it in verse 7.

“Ariel” is a Hebrew name, which, through its connection with Ezekiel 43, appears to suggest that Jerusalem is going to burn. Nephi would have been very familiar with this name for his home town, just as New Yorkers are familiar with “The Big Apple”.

“Zion” on the other hand, is probably not a Hebrew word. Nephi would have understood it to mean “Mount Zion” (Isaiah 29:8 ); i.e., a specific place in Jerusalem. Joseph Smith however, used “Zion” in much broader terms; i.e., the gathering place of the saints, which is how the word is used in 2 Nephi 27:3.

McGuire Quote:

And of course, I attribute the actual use of the King James Version to the translation process (or whatever process it was) that produced the modern text. It clearly relied on the KJV.

Mortal Man: I heartily agree, but let me just note that this puts you directly at odds with DCP and the majority of BoM apologists.

Which majority? B. H. Roberts, H. Grant Vest, Sidney B. Sperry, Stanley R. Larson, and Daniel H. Ludlow have all argued that Joseph Smith certainly utilized a copy of the KJV Bible whenever he came to lengthy portions of the text of the Book of Mormon obviously paralleling biblical passages.

McGuire Quote:

The transition to the next literary unit occurs in 28:1 - which reads: "And now, behold, my brethren, I have spoken unto you, according as the Spirit hath constrained me; wherefore, I know that they must surely come to pass."

Mortal Man: Doesn’t it strike you as odd that, after quoting 12 straight verses virtually verbatim from KJV-Isaiah 29, Nephi declares, “I have spoken unto you”?

A charitable reading might take that as Nephi having read words and commented on them in extenso in the previous chapter. Indeed, this is excellent evidence that II Nephi 27 is indeed midrashic commentary rather than straight quotation. It strikes me as odd that you don't see from this the incredible weakness of your position.

McGuire Quote:

Now when you say that the other verses being quoted is irrelevant is a much bigger problem. Those verses are quoted within the scope of the narrative unit that I identify - and more importantly they are presented in order. They are not somehow taken out of sequence.

Mortal Man: “Marvelous work and a wonder” (25:17) is out of sequence.

If it is out of sequence, how then can it be part of a systematic quotation rather than commentary? Oh, sorry, you already dropped that claim just above.

McGuire Quote:

It is as if the author of 2 Nephi 26-27 intended to use most of chapter 29 of Isaiah and did so, interspersing commentary.

Mortal Man: I absolutely agree.

O.K. So now you agree that II Nephi 26-27 is indeed midrashic commentary interspersed among the quotations?

McGuire Quote:

you didn't take the time to understand the LDS position on the text, and you didn't take the time to look at the implications of your claims.

Mortal Man: The LDS position is that Nephi quoted off the Brass Plates and that the JST was necessary “to restore truths to the Bible text that had become lost or changed since the original words were written” and to recover “certain truths that the original authors had once recorded” (those statements appeared on the official LDS website until shortly after I first posted my essay on MADB).

Rather than being uncorrelated, Mortal Man, you are clearly the most correlated Mormon imaginable -- even taking non-canonical words on an "official" LDS website as canonical. And you claim that it feels good to be untrammeled. Did you mean to say inconsistent?

[volgadon]

Rather than being uncorrelated, Mortal Man, you are clearly the most correlated Mormon imaginable -- even taking non-canonical words on an "official" LDS website as canonical. And you claim that it feels good to be untrammeled. Did you mean to say inconsistent?

Polemics makes for strange bedfellows.

[Benjamin McGuire]

Andrew, in order to keep this in perspective, I am going to respond to several things you posted in your last two comments here a bit out of order. My intention is to keep several issues together.

You wrote:

Alas, the truth is polemical to some people. I can only do so much to shield you from it.

And

I’m very open to this possibility, in fact, I long for it. But I also reserve the right to question it. It feels so good not to be trammeled.

And back on May 5, you made these comments on Shade’s board (in a similar post as this one):

So who intentionally deleted JST-Isaiah 29:11-26 from the King James and other Bible versions?

I've asked this question many times of many different apologists and have yet to receive a single response.

First I want to quote something written by Elder Bruce Hafen (I thought you might enjoy it since you seem to love quotes from church general authorities). This is from his book The Believing Heart:

Despite the value of a level-two awareness, however, there are some serious hazards at this stage. One's acceptance of the clouds of uncertainty may be so complete that the iron rod fades into the receding mist and skepticism becomes a guiding philosophy. Often, this perspective comes from erasing the outer circle, representing the ideal, or what ought to be, and then focusing excessively on the inner circle of reality.

...

I find myself wanting to tell our third-year law students that those who take too much delight in their finely honed tools of skepticism and dispassionate analysis will limit their effectiveness, in the Church and elsewhere, because they can become contentious, standoffish, arrogant, and unwilling to commit themselves. I have seen some of them try out their new intellectual tools in a priesthood quorum or a Sunday School class. A well-meaning teacher will make a point they think is a little silly, and they will feel an irresistible urge to leap to their feet and publicly deflate the teacher's momentum. If they are successful, they begin looking for other opportunities to point out the exception to any rule anybody can state. They begin to delight in cross-examination of the unsuspecting, just looking for somebody's bubble of idealism floating around so that they can pop it with their shiny new pin of skepticism. And in all that, they fail to realize that when some of those bubbles pop, out goes much of the feeling of trust, loyalty, harmony, and sincerity so essential to preserving the Spirit of the Lord.

It seems to me that part of what you have been saying is that you don’t like my tone. I think that it must be Karma. You come across as very patronizing. You talk about the “truth” (particularly when it seems to me that you don’t really have any). You should instead be talking about what you believe perhaps, or what you think is accurate. I find it rather amusing, for example, that in your blog entry that dealt in part with chiasmus you said this (and I already quoted it, but bear with me):

So what happens if we embark on an apologetic hunt for Hebraisms in some other book of known authorship? Robert Patterson has applied the same methodologies to Green Eggs & Ham as apologists have applied to the Book of Mormon and found Dr. Seuss’ text to be packed full of Hebraisms and teeming with literary and Semitic complexity.

Your essay references some works by LDS apologists dealing with chiasmus in the Book of Mormon. The work by the LDS apologists that you reference does not use the same methodology that Patterson uses. In fact, I provided Patterson’s summary of his method (we all saw how short it was). It seems to me that you are the spitting image of Hafen’s skeptic (and you aren’t the first that I have run across). There is a real gap between what you are saying, and what you are doing. Being trammeled? I have never been trammeled. I certainly am not terribly orthodox in everything I think or write. And while you suggest that you are open, I haven't seen you ever write anything to suggest that this is genuine and not merely a posture. This thread is really very good evidence that it is in fact nothing but posture. After all, my arguments are not bad arguments, but you don't look at them as being a viable option - you jump on everything, defending the indefensible really. No, I don't think that you are really all that open at all.

You noted this:

My brief comments on chiasmus in that essay were merely introductory.

They weren’t intended to constitute an exhaustive study of the subject.

Nor was I addressing a specialized audience.

I was addressing a general audience.

I only intended to list a few important considerations relating to the topic.

In order to motivate the discussion of if/and conditionals, which form the heart of the essay.

These are all excuses – and what they don’t do, is justify your being wrong on so many points. It doesn’t matter if you were writing to specialists or not – you were misrepresenting not only what chiasmus is, you were misrepresenting what LDS apologists claim it to be, and you were doing so in a way to enhance your polemical argument. (And as a side note, something being “true” has nothing to do with an argument being polemical either). I write polemical things from time to time. Clearly, all of my comments in this thread have been polemical (and I like to think that they have also been generally true). The difference, as I see it, is that I can be quite candid about the polemical nature of my comments. I am not the one that is saying one thing and doing something quite different. You are trying to burst bubbles (to use Hafen’s metaphor). In reality, the specifics (and what you might mean when you say ‘exhaustive study’) don’t terribly interest you – because they don’t really relate to the purpose of your blog entries. Your purpose seems quite obviously to me to try and show conflict, contradictions, ambiguities so that others will come to agree with you on the problems that you believed existed long before you tried to come up with proof.

Well, I am an apologist, I have answered your question, you just don’t seem to like the answer. Of course we both know that an answer won’t change your view of the “truth”. And rather than concede the obvious, you start up the moving target to deflect as much as you can.

Now, since I don’t think we have started another thread yet, I want to make a few more comments here about the chiasmus stuff. You wrote:

LOL! That was completely unintentional. But after I wrote it, I thought to myself, “it would be pretty funny to turn that into a chiasmus.” But then I thought, “naw, Ben is mad enough as it is,” so left it like it was.

I don't believe that it was completely unintentional. My experience is that these things never are in such a discussion. And, I might point out that the language that you present seems forced. So assert it all you want that it was accidental - you won't convince me at this point. It seems quite obvious to me that you doctored the text a bit to make the chiasmus much more believable. In doing this, it became intention (even if your purpose for the chiasmus was external to the chiasmus itself – a quite fitting example of a figure of speech).

If you want to move a discussion of chiasmus to another thread, I will be happy to discuss it with you there. We probably don’t need to continue it here – I introduced it to make a point (and I think I made it). Now on to the real meat of the discussion.

Ben M.

[Benjamin McGuire]

Part 1 of 2

Andrew writes:

You’ve made a reasonable argument that the author of 2 Nephi 26 & 27 plagiarized Isaiah 29, except for the first two verses, which have too many Ariels in them to be of use.

And you obviously don't know what the word 'plagiarism' means. I don't think that anyone could reasonably construe that the author of 2 Nephi plagiarized Isaiah 29.

The problem is that the author starts his train of thought in 26:15 but after only 4 verses gets completely derailed. He jumps here and there all over the Bible, even quoting the Ten Commandments in verse 32, and finally lands at the bottom of a cliff by verse 33.

At this point, we have moved into a discussion on interpretation. I think that you misinterpret 2 Nephi. At the core of this is the idea of copying, or plagiarizing. I used the term reinscription - which is something quite different. But, this reuse of scriptural texts (and modifying them or simply quoting them) has a long history in the Old Testament. The quote, by the way, that you brought up from is interesting, but, you probably ought to take a look at Fishbane's very, very good book A Prophet Reads Scripture: Allusion in Isaiah 40-66. And I think in some ways you misunderstood what Fishbane was saying. I want to address this in some detail a bit later - because I think it is an important and relevant issue to this discussion.

The quoting of Isaiah 29 starts in 2 Nephi 26:15.

Actually, it starts in 25:17.

I am not sure what you are reading there. Yes, there is a reference to Isaiah 29:14 - that is, 2 Nephi 25:17 reads -

And the Lord will set his hand again the second time to restore his people from their lost and fallen state. Wherefore, he will proceed to do a marvelous work and a wonder among the children of men.

Now, we can all see the phrase that triggered your perception, but let me point out the issues.

1: 2 Nephi 25:17 contains an isolated phrase. It is repeated in 2 Nephi 27. It does not have any other material attached to it. The passage from 2 Nephi 26:14 to 27:35 contains nearly all of Isaiah 29 in the same order in which it occurs in the Isaiah text.

2: The argument about 25:17 would make more sense if 2 Nephi 25:17 wasn't more of a collage. If Nephi quotes Isaiah 29:14, then he is almost certainly also quoting Isaiah 11:11 as well. And this means that a recitation of Isaiah 29 does not begin in 2 Nephi 25 as you suggest. 2 Nephi alludes to Isaiah 29, but even then, it has modified the text (made it more universal) by changing “among this people” to “among the children of men”. Likewise, there is a modification of Isaiah 11:11 from “the remnant of his people, which shall be left” to “his people from their lost and fallen state”. What has happened is that statements referring to a restoration of Israel have been replaced with a discussion on the atonement, in which redemption is made not just for Israel, but the whole world.

3: Although I used the term “quoting”, I want to emphasize that I do not believe that everything between 2 Nephi 26:15 and 2 Nephi 27:35 has been quoted. While some of the material is obviously identical (and can thus be called a quotation), in general, the material is reused – and that reuse, like the material mentioned above, makes changes, reinterprets, adds to it, leaves elements out, and so on. It is an adaption and not some kind of verbatim reuse. The material has been repurposed. Even with that observation, I think we can see that the material in Isaiah 29 frames that part of the sermon recorded in 2 Nephi 26-27. And it doesn’t frame the earlier material in 2 Nephi 25.

4: David P. Wright (whom you have used from time to time) recognizes in his Dialogue article “The exegesis is usally placed in chapters following citation of the text ... though occaisionally it is interspersed in the citation (2 Ne. 6:6-18; 26:15-26:35). It is noteworthy because, instead of laying out the original historical meaning of Isaiah, it reapplies the text to the time of Joseph Smith and to the course of Jewish and Christian history up to his time.” Later, his more detailed analysis in the same article suggest “Isaiah 29 is cited in the middle of this larger interpretive discourse. The citation begins in 2 Nephi 26:15-16, 18 (=Isa. 29:3-5)”. I think that it is safe to say that it doesn’t require a faithful LDS perspective to read the text in this way. Wright and I agree on many issues (without, of course, agreeing in all of our conclusions).

I think you misunderstood my earlier comment about the chapter breaks. The modern BoM chapter breaks are irrelevant.

And I think that you misunderstood my comment. What I am telling you is that if the current chapter 27 of 2 Nephi began with what is now 2 Nephi 26:14, I don't think we would be having this discussion. It seems clear to me that from the outset, your impression of the relationship between Isaiah 29 and 2 Nephi 27 has been in part determined by the unoriginal chapter breaks in 2 Nephi.

What is relevant is the fact that chapter XI in the 1830 edition matches up with chapter 29 of Isaiah. The KJV chapter breaks did not exist in Isaiah until Archbishop Stephen Langton put them there in the 13th century. The most that could have existed on the Brass Plates, were setumah or petuhah demarcating much shorter text units. For Nephi to begin (except for the Ariel verses) and end on the breaks corresponding to Langton’s divisions is a stunning coincidence.

Not as stunning as you might think. With the exception of the last 3 verses, the entire chapter 29 is seen as a related block of text in the Great Isaiah Scroll that you link to. (That is, 29:1-29:21 occurs as a contiguous block of text).

With regards to this issue, the Isaiah pesher in the Dead Sea Scrolls (4Q163) has a different ordering of the verses of Isaiah 29. Verse 17 is moved to the end of this unit and is followed by verse 1 of chapter 30. (This of course doesn’t support any reading in the Book of Mormon, it just suggests that 21-23 was considered to be a part of the material in chapter 29 as opposed to the material that follows). I include this merely as a curiosity (I am not suggesting that this rises to a level that could be called evidence). But my point is that the assertion that seeing Isaiah chapter 29 as a natural literary unit in the text is not as far fetched as you seem to suggest. I suspect I could come up with more information on this – but I don’t have the time at the moment.

Continued

[Benjamin McGuire]

Part 2 of 2

For the purpose of moving this discussion along, let’s assume for the moment that Joseph Smith and Bruce R. McConkie were wrong and that 2 Nephi 27 was not copied off the Brass Plates but rather is Nephi’s midrash. Please explain to us whether Nephi interpreted Isaiah 29 correctly; if so, how; if not, why not?

I have several comments here. First, the appeal to Bruce R. McConkie is a rather transparent ploy (and I refer back to my earlier post today). Bruce R. McConkie is being appealed to for his apparent authority as a religious leader, not for any expertise on the subject of texts, or textual history. His opinion is therefore of very little value for this discussion, and is introduced only for the larger purposes of your polemical position (which I previously mentioned). I have no problems suggesting that Bruce R. McConkie was wrong. The next issue is related. I think that there are a couple of possibilities with Joseph Smith. The first is that it is quite easy to conceive that Joseph misread the Book of Mormon and believed that it suggested that Nephi had produced material original to Isaiah. I don’t find this to be very convincing myself. The second issue is the question of what the JST is. There is a growing recognition that the JST is not a restoration per se, but more of an interpretive commentary (see for example Kevin Barney’s Dialogue article on the JST – a position which I note did not cause him to be “trammeled”). You are equating the JST with the idea of a restoration of a historical text – but this view is not a unanimous view among LDS (and it is not one that I believe). This is the reason, though, that you bring up the position of authority. It is a clear move to push this secondary view as heterodox. So, assuming that either they were wrong, or that your understanding of the implications is wrong, did Nephi interpret Isaiah 29 correctly?

This is a rather silly question to ask a post-modernist like myself. What constitutes an incorrect interpretation? I have more to say on this subject, and it ties in with what Fishbane had to say, so I will save it for last.

“Zion” on the other hand, is probably not a Hebrew word. Nephi would have understood it to mean “Mount Zion” (Isaiah 29:8 ); i.e., a specific place in Jerusalem. Joseph Smith however, used “Zion” in much broader terms; i.e., the gathering place of the saints, which is how the word is used in 2 Nephi 27:3.

Just a quick note on this issue. Nephi is recording a sermon which he apparently gave (its possible it was only written, but as you note, the language refers regularly to it as more of a speech act in the traditional sense of a speech). He is recording it decades after he has left Jerusalem. No matter what Nephi may know about “a specific place in Jerusalem”, the only person(s) present who would have had an awareness of that specific place would be Nephi, his brother Sam, their wives, and any of his surviving sisters (if present) their spouses, Zoram (and his wife), and perhaps Nephi’s mother (I forget off the top of my head if the text makes mention of her death). The vast majority of his audience would have no point of reference for such a specific place. And we have to understand that this is part of the reason for the back drop of likening the scriptures unto themselves. Again, more on this in a minute.

I heartily agree, but let me just note that this puts you directly at odds with DCP and the majority of BoM apologists.

I don’t think this is the case at all. I am quite confident that DCP would agree with me. I can even ask him if you like. I think that I tend to try to be very precise with my terms. In this case, we can say that the language occurs in the Book of Mormon the way that it occurs precisely because it occurs within the KJV the way it occurs there. This is a classic description of textual reliance. I do not mean to imply that when the Book of Mormon was translated that a copy of the KJV was used (it might have been, or it might not have been). I find that the Book of Mormon relying on the KJV language is not incongruent with the idea of divine assistance in translation. I note in passing that my usage of the idea of reliance isn’t particularly radical. And that on these terms, I am pretty comfortable suggesting that DCP would agree with me. I also find that not too many apologists disagree with me (contra your assertion). Since I communicate with many of them on a regular basis, I tend to think that my anecdotal evidence probably has a bit more weight than yours (but I could be guessing). It is worth pointing out that I mention this idea in my article published by the Maxwell Institute in their Journal, and as I recall, it didn’t generate any comment.

Doesn’t it strike you as odd that, after quoting 12 straight verses virtually verbatim from KJV-Isaiah 29, Nephi declares, “I have spoken unto you”?

No. I think it largely fits the pattern of biblical exegesis we see in the Book of Mormon (and in particular in Jacob and Nephi). This just happens to be one of the longer sequences of verbatim text – but I think it does point to this being a sermon that was spoken before it was written, and this is indicated by other signifiers in the text as well.

“Marvelous work and a wonder” (25:17) is out of sequence.

No, I don’t think so (for reasons given earlier). I don’t believe that it should be considered as part of the recital of Isaiah 29 – and neither does David Wright (as I pointed out).

Is this really necessary?

Yes. Within this context, it refers to someone who does not recognize references to another text because of a lack of familiarity with that text. Someone who is completely unfamiliar with a source text will simply never recognize an allusion to that source (it isn’t possible). Being familiar with a source (and thus capable of recognizing a quote, or an allusion, or a reinscription) is considered necessary to be a competent reader of a text.

Oh really? How exactly can we understand this?

Does the Book of Mormon use the text of Isaiah? You yourself agree that it does. So, the issue of how Nephi uses it, or interprets it, and whether it is a correct interpretation or not is largely irrelevant to the point that he does in fact use it.

I will simply point out that you’ve got the cause and effect mixed up. My arguments are not driven by a lack of belief but vice versa.

Allow me to disagree with you. I think that you have a vested interest in appearing a certain way here in this discussion, and that you then portray yourself in that certain way – but that portrayal isn’t consistent with your responses and what you actually write. I am evaluating your responses and what you write (not just here, of course, but in all of the forums and articles in which I encounter you) and on that basis I form my opinions.

The LDS position is that Nephi quoted off the Brass Plates and that the JST was necessary “to restore truths to the Bible text that had become lost or changed since the original words were written” and to recover “certain truths that the original authors had once recorded” (those statements appeared on the official LDS website until shortly after I first posted my essay on MADB).

And of course, they have been removed. They certainly weren’t written by Joseph Smith, and they obviously don’t reflect (in such a narrow way) the perspective of all the members of the church. And perhaps, given the recent discussions within the community of faithful believers of the church, the church is changing its public stance to accommodate reasonable alternatives. Now, here I would like to add one comment – it is a fundamentalist mind set that refuses to allow for inconsistencies. And while there are many Mormons who perhaps have a fundamentalist mind set (perhaps just in part), I don’t think that most LDS (certainly not most in my immediate experience, but then I do not live in the middle of cultural Mormondom) have such a rigid perspective on things that such a statement would be considered the only possibility. And this speaks again about your agenda. You seem to be intent on painting me (as other critics have in the past) as some kind of other voice – something distant – something uncorrelated perhaps (to use a phrase that you want to apply to yourself). So, I am not sure that in a discussion like this, a statement from the Church website has any relevance at all. Perhaps you would like to be a bit clearer in why you think that Bruce R. McConkie or the Church’s website, or even Joseph Smith (assuming that he is not the author of the Book of Mormon) is giving us the authoritative view? Do you believe that they are the authoritative voice in the matter? As a non-believer (and I am fairly confident that you are non-believer) you seem to me to be trying to push on us a notion that you yourself do not believe at all under some sort of notion that we should accept what you do not.

Now, back to Fishbane. Fishbane. Nephi spends a great deal of time telling us that Isaiah is a wonderful text. He also tells us very clearly that it takes a certain knowledge set to understand Isaiah. And it comes in close proximity to these passages we have been discussing. From 2 Nephi 25 verses 1-6 , let me provide a couple of pertinent excerpts.

Isaiah spake many things which were hard for many of my people to understand; for they know not concerning the manner of prophesying among the Jews. For I, Nephi, have not taught them many things concerning the manner of the Jews; … for I came out from Jerusalem, and mine eyes hath beheld the things of the Jews, and I know that the Jews do understand the things of the prophets, and there is none other people that understand the things which were spoken unto the Jews like unto them, save it be that they are taught after the manner of the things of the Jews. But behold, I, Nephi, have not taught my children after the manner of the Jews;

Nephi understands Isaiah because he was taught certain things. He does not teach his children those things – thus we can (following my earlier comments) describe them as incompetent readers of Isaiah. And Nephi admits this – they had a hard time understanding it. So Nephi likens the scriptures unto himself. He changes them, he moves them from referring to things in Jerusalem and for Israel and Judah to having a wider application which includes the Nephites/Lamanites and the while world. This would follow to some extent Fishbane’s pattern of prophets reusing scripture. And as Fishbane points out, at least within Nephite society, it would be the meaning that Nephi gives these texts that would become the natural and dominant reading – not an earlier meaning attributed to Isaiah. (Likewise, as you yourself have pointed out, Joseph could take from the Book of Mormon and apply something more narrowly to himself – perhaps something that wasn’t applied as intended by its Nephite author).

Scripture clearly gets reused all the time. Whether it is the chronicler modifying and correcting earlier texts, or the New Testament using (and abusing) Isaiah and other Old Testament authors, I think that we have developed notions of what authors are, of what texts mean that is probably inconsistent with this view of revelation and its use and re-use. But I do not think that this is bad interpretation or incorrect interpretation. Like Nephi, I agree with the idea that it is perfectly valid to remove a text from its context and create new interpretations that have completely foreign meanings to original intent. The only real problem isn’t in creating new meaning by reapplying texts – by re-contextualizing them. The only real problem occurs when we try to retrospectively force that interpretation backwards and to suggest that this is what the original author intended. Despite your assertions that there is a misapplication or a misinterpretation here, Nephi's writings suggest that he would not have viewed it this way at all - and it's a theme that is developed through the entire writings of First and Second Nephi.

Ben McGuire

[Mortal Man]

You blithely ignored my comments on the "JST" work of Sidney Rigdon and Joseph Smith (using an 1828 Phinney Bible purchased at the Grandin Bookstore by Oliver Cowdery):

I haven't ignored anything in this thread. I appreciate your well-considered comments but have limited time to respond. Since the scope of this thread has become extremely broad, I'm going to try to hit just the most relevant points.

I did not "claim that JST-Isaiah 29:11-16 is a mistake," and I'm not sure that anyone else did either.

“I believe the Bible as it read when it came from the pen of the original writers. Ignorant translators, careless transcribers, or designing and corrupt priests have committed many errors.” -- Joseph Smith

Does the JST Bible better represent "the pen of the original writers" than the KJV Bible?

Does the JST restore “plain and precious things which had been taken away”?

Footnote b in Isaiah 29:11 in the LDS Bible links to Joseph Smith-History 1:65:

“He then said to me, ‘Let me see that certificate.’ I accordingly took it out of my pocket and gave it to him, when he took it and tore it to pieces, saying that there was no such thing now as ministering of angels, and that if I would bring the plates to him he would translate them. I informed him that part of the plates were sealed, and that I was forbidden to bring them. He replied, ‘I cannot read a sealed book.’ I left him and went to Dr. Mitchell, who sanctioned what Professor Anthon had said respecting both the characters and the translation.”

Is this what Isaiah had in mind when he penned that verse?

Why do you insist on giving non-canonical writings such importance?

David Seely says they're important.

[Mortal Man]

O.K. So now you agree that II Nephi 26-27 is indeed midrashic commentary interspersed among the quotations?

Robert, this discussion has gone all over the map, mostly I think, due to misunderstandings. So, rather than trying to chase them all down, I'm going to try to simplify things by clarifying my position.

To you and me (and any text critic worth his salt), II Nephi 26-27 is obviously midrashic commentary interspersed among the Isaiah quotations (just as you noted). In my essay, I explicitly stated that II Nephi 27:6-24 is a midrash. The question has always been: whose midrash? This is not an easy question to answer for the following reasons:

1. II Nephi 27:6-24 is virtually identical to JST-Isaiah 29:11-26. The only way to reconcile this without throwing the JST under the bus is to assert that II Nephi 27:6-24 came off the Brass Plates.
2. The angel Moroni quoted Isaiah 29:11-14 to JS on multiple occasions saying, "the scripture must be fulfilled before it is translated, which says that the words of a book, which were sealed, were presented to the learned."
3. Moroni provided details found only in the midrash and attributed them to Isaiah. He didn't say anything about Nephi; he clearly understood the prophecy to be original to Isaiah.
4. It thus follows that Nephi's audience understood II Nephi 27:6-24 to be original to Isaiah.
5. Joseph told Emily Austin that he had to fulfill “that which Isaiah the prophet had spoken of..."
6. Joseph wrote in his journal, "and thus the Prophicy of Isaiaah was fulfilled which is writen in the 29 chapter concerning the book.”
7. Never once did JS or anyone else in the early church refer to this as Nephi's interpretation.
8. There is no change of voice or any transition whatsoever between the direct Isaiah quotations (2-5 & 25-35) and the midrash (6-24). In fact, the transition to direct quotation at 24-25 occurs mid-sentence.
9. By just looking at II Nephi 27, assuming no prior knowledge of Isaiah 29, it would be impossible to determine whose words were whose.

For the above reasons, I claim that JS would not have called II Nephi 27:6-24 a midrash. He would have claimed that it came from the Brass Plates. Before going further, I would like to know if you agree with my assessment of Joseph's understanding.

[Mortal Man]

Now, since I don’t think we have started another thread yet, I want to make a few more comments here about the chiasmus stuff. You wrote:

I don't believe that it was completely unintentional. My experience is that these things never are in such a discussion. And, I might point out that the language that you present seems forced. So assert it all you want that it was accidental - you won't convince me at this point. It seems quite obvious to me that you doctored the text a bit to make the chiasmus much more believable. In doing this, it became intention (even if your purpose for the chiasmus was external to the chiasmus itself – a quite fitting example of a figure of speech).

The alleged chiasmus was completely unintentional, exactly as it appeared. The fact that you refuse to accept this is mildly amusing.

What's even more amusing is the fact that you completely missed my intentional chiasmus. It's clear that you missed it because you broke it up when you quoted it.

It's really quite stunning that you identified an unintentional rather-vague chiasmus as deliberate while missing an intentional near-perfect chiasmus.

Alas! Divining the chiastic intentions of a mind not your own is a dubious proposition, eh?

(P.S. Perhaps you can use your finely honed chiasm-hunting skills to go back through this thread and identify the intentional chiasmus I spoke of. Hint: it's of the ABCDDCBA form, one line per letter.)

[Benjamin McGuire]

For the record, Andrew, were you aware that the current LDS Gospel Doctrine Manual for the Book of Mormon has this to say on the subject?

Instruct students to read the chapter heading for 2 Nephi 27. Explain that this chapter contains one of the most significant prophecies about the latter-day Restoration—a prophecy about the coming forth of the Book of Mormon. Also explain that 2 Nephi 26 and 27 include many important details that are not found in the biblical record of Isaiah’s prophecy. These additional details could be either a restoration of Isaiah’s text or Nephi’s inspired commentary on what Isaiah taught.

Ben M.

[Mortal Man]

With the exception of the last 3 verses, the entire chapter 29 is seen as a related block of text in the Great Isaiah Scroll that you link to. (That is, 29:1-29:21 occurs as a contiguous block of text).

With regards to this issue, the Isaiah pesher in the Dead Sea Scrolls (4Q163) has a different ordering of the verses of Isaiah 29. Verse 17 is moved to the end of this unit and is followed by verse 1 of chapter 30. (This of course doesn’t support any reading in the Book of Mormon, it just suggests that 21-23 was considered to be a part of the material in chapter 29 as opposed to the material that follows). I include this merely as a curiosity (I am not suggesting that this rises to a level that could be called evidence). But my point is that the assertion that seeing Isaiah chapter 29 as a natural literary unit in the text is not as far fetched as you seem to suggest. I suspect I could come up with more information on this – but I don’t have the time at the moment.

Any way you slice it Ben, the fact that the author terminated his reinscription precisely at the end of Isaiah 29 (where Joseph inserted a chapter break to match the KJV chapter break) is not a good thing for Nephi.

[cdowis]

Let me quote the heart of your argument

Joseph Smith’s expanded version of Isaiah 29 is not attested in either the Septuagint or the Qumran Great Isaiah Scroll. The extra verses do not appear in the Codex Sinaiticus, the Latin Vulgate nor any other pre-1829 text. By any reasonable standard of textual criticism (lectio brevior in particular) the JST verses depend on the Nephi verses, which depend on the KJV verses, which derive from the Masoretic Text. In recognition of these difficulties, Cloward, Tvedtnes and others allege that the extra verses belong to Nephi, rather than Isaiah.

Your logic has a tiny flaw.... it is based on the assumption that each of these come from the same textual family or tradition. Let me quote wiki: "The Masoretic text is the authoritative Hebrew text of the ****Jewish**** Bible".

Now let me give you a quiz. Does the Brass Plates claim to be from that textual tradition? Note, for example, the blessing of Joseph in the BOM and compare that to the *****Jewish***** Bible. I have used astericks to give a subtle hint on the answer.

The Brass Plates are from ========== textual tradition which was removed from the ======= textual tradition. Nephi, et al, TOOK the Brass Plates away, never to be seen again by those in Jerusalem.

Can you fill in the blanks?

The Isaiah verses quoted here in the BOM are different from the Jewish Hebrew Bible for the same reason that the blessings of Joseph are more detailed in the ========= textual tradition.

The Jews had no interest in what was going on with the house of Joseph, and their textual tradition reflected that lack of interest.

By way of documentation and justification, I refer you to the first few chapters of Second Nephi where we find many details about Joseph, his history, blessings, and especially his future generations that are missing from the Jewish Bible.

This particular "additions" to Isaiah refers specifically to Joseph's descendants, and specifically the prophet named Joseph who was to bring forth the record of Joseph to the world.

The Jews would have zero interest in such things.

[Benjamin McGuire]

Any way you slice it Ben, the fact that the author terminated his reinscription precisely at the end of Isaiah 29 (where Joseph inserted a chapter break to match the KJV chapter break) is not a good thing for Nephi.

I don't think it is nearly the problem you think it is. By the way, out of curiosity, how would you describe the process of putting the original chapter breaks in when the Book of Mormon was being dictated?

On another note, we also have an Ensign article from September 1988 (this is in part to deal with the reference you left to David Seely's article), titled "Book of Mormon Commentary on Isaiah" we read this:

Nephi begins: “But behold, I prophesy unto you concerning the last days; concerning the days when the Lord God shall bring these things forth unto the children of men.

...

Nephi continues this methodical explication throughout 2 Nephi 26 and 27 (Isa. 29) by quoting sections of Isaiah, then commenting, then resuming his quoting more of Isaiah.

It seems to me that the Church doesn't have this clear view that you are trying to suggest - the Church has apparently for quite some time now suggested that reading 2 Nephi as commentary is quite acceptable and perhaps even orthodox. It is apparently a correlated point of view.

Ben M.