The State of the Evidence

[Robert F. Smith]

4 minutes ago, jkwilliams said:

Kantian or not, that was the answer I received to fervent prayer. The meaning was absolutely clear to me on that December day in the woods. 

Do you imagine anyone on this board disagreeing with your declaration that  "I don't have to believe in things that aren't true"?  I don't.  However, again, it begs the truth question:  How do we know what we know? Was your stake president's answer adequate?  Or was he also begging the question?  It may be that the answer to such questions is irrelevant, but, if that is the case, I'd like to know why.  The same applies to intellectual appraisals of Mormonism:  Which are valid, and why?

[stemelbow]

8 minutes ago, jkwilliams said:

Kantian or not, that was the answer I received to fervent prayer. The meaning was absolutely clear to me on that December day in the woods. 

God will lead people in or out of the Church for his own purposes.  I'd repeat again and again, I imagine it doesn't matter one whit to God whether someone is a member or not.  It might matter they go where He may lead, but there is always course correction to come anyway.  There is far too much good to cling to to assume God only leads members or only wants His people in the Church. 

[jkwilliams]

4 minutes ago, Robert F. Smith said:

Do you imagine anyone on this board disagreeing with your declaration that  "I don't have to believe in things that aren't true"?  I don't.  However, again, it begs the truth question:  How do we know what we know? Was your stake president's answer adequate?  Or was he also begging the question?  It may be that the answer to such questions is irrelevant, but, if that is the case, I'd like to know why.  The same applies to intellectual appraisals of Mormonism:  Which are valid, and why?

I don't prescribe how anyone does intellectual appraisal of anything, and I certainly don't pretend to know which are valid and why.

[jkwilliams]

3 minutes ago, stemelbow said:

God will lead people in or out of the Church for his own purposes.  I'd repeat again and again, I imagine it doesn't matter one whit to God whether someone is a member or not.  It might matter they go where He may lead, but there is always course correction to come anyway.  There is far too much good to cling to to assume God only leads members or only wants His people in the Church. 

Everyone must find the path that is right for them. 

[Tacenda]

2 minutes ago, jkwilliams said:

Everyone must find the path that is right for them. 

I don't think many LDS even care if the church has proof of it's being the true church, they just love the culture, the boundaries, the morals, the organization, the opportunities to serve, the built in friendships...too many to list. 

[jkwilliams]

3 minutes ago, Tacenda said:

I don't think many LDS even care if the church has proof of it's being the true church, they just love the culture, the boundaries, the morals, the organization, the opportunities to serve, the built in friendships...too many to list. 

I can't speak for anyone other than myself. I loved most of that, but really, I had a testimony and was sure it was God's kingdom on earth. That was my main motivation.

[Robert F. Smith]

2 minutes ago, Tacenda said:

I don't think many LDS even care if the church has proof of it's being the true church, they just love the culture, the boundaries, the morals, the organization, the opportunities to serve, the built in friendships...too many to list. 

You are very likely correct, Tacenda.  And that is likely true for all religions and ideologies as cultural attributes.  That at least is what the research shows.

[Tacenda]

Just now, jkwilliams said:

I can't speak for anyone other than myself. I loved most of that, but really, I had a testimony and was sure it was God's kingdom on earth. That was my main motivation.

Just wanted to state that because of my recent readings of those that are in your shoes and have spouses that don't care about proof, they just love being in the church, whether true or false. I'm somewhat similar in believing it's a nice place to be, but still let the doubt happen and my testimony crumble away. Unlike those that don't care to find proof.

[jkwilliams]

1 minute ago, Tacenda said:

Just wanted to state that because of my recent readings of those that are in your shoes and have spouses that don't care about proof, they just love being in the church, whether true or false. I'm somewhat similar in believing it's a nice place to be, but still let the doubt happen and my testimony crumble away. Unlike those that don't care to find proof.

FWIW, my wife has a testimony that the gospel is true, and that is what matters to her. So, I would never say she doesn't care whether it's true or false. We just don't approach things exactly the same way.

[Tacenda]

1 minute ago, jkwilliams said:

FWIW, my wife has a testimony that the gospel is true, and that is what matters to her. So, I would never say she doesn't care whether it's true or false. We just don't approach things exactly the same way.

So maybe it's not as common as I think.

[Jeanne]

11 minutes ago, jkwilliams said:

I can't speak for anyone other than myself. I loved most of that, but really, I had a testimony and was sure it was God's kingdom on earth. That was my main motivation.

i did too.  That testimony had nothing to do with service...or anything else.  That testimony itself served to find joy in all those other things..but it was first for me.

[Tacenda]

JK, maybe it's not that they don't care whether it's true or not, these members just don't care to find out if it's false, because they are happy the way it is. So they do think it's true.

[Tacenda]

Just like that darn question...if the church were false, would you want to know?

[Tacenda]

And the question to non LDS Christians and LDS Christians, if it is proven Jesus Christ isn't the Saviour, would you want to know? 

Edited June 29, 2016 by Tacenda

[jkwilliams]

1 minute ago, Tacenda said:

Just like that darn question...if the church were false, would you want to know?

Just like the question to non LDS Christians, if it is proven Jesus Christ isn't the Saviour, would you want to know? 

How would you "prove" either?

[Tacenda]

5 minutes ago, jkwilliams said:

How would you "prove" either?

I don't know that we can.  Which is a good thing!  

[JLHPROF]

48 minutes ago, Tacenda said:

And the question to non LDS Christians and LDS Christians, if it is proven Jesus Christ isn't the Saviour, would you want to know?

This may seem like an extreme reaction, but it could be 100% proven that there was no God, no afterlife, and no Savior, I am not sure I would bother getting out of bed the next day or breathing in and out.
I don't think there would be much incentive to deal with all the trials and stresses of mortal existence if we all end up as worm food and the earth is destroyed by some scientific phenomenon.  What a waste of effort and an abundance of problems would be the life without God.
 

[jkwilliams]

Just now, JLHPROF said:

This may seem like an extreme reaction, but it could be 100% proven that there was no God, no afterlife, and no Savior, I am not sure I would bother getting out of bed the next day or breathing in and out.
I don't think there would be much incentive to deal with all the trials and stresses of mortal existence if we all end up as worm food and the earth is destroyed by some scientific phenomenon.  What a waste of effort and an abundance of problems would be the life without God.
 

Yeah, that is an extreme reaction. I can't imagine a life as bad as you describe, and I'm one who suffers from pretty bad depression. Even if there is nothing after death, there is plenty to celebrate and to love about life. We only waste our effort if we choose to.

[Johnnie Cake]

1 hour ago, Tacenda said:

I don't think many LDS even care if the church has proof of it's being the true church, they just love the culture, the boundaries, the morals, the organization, the opportunities to serve, the built in friendships...too many to list. 

I loved being a member of the church though at times I was embarrassed to be so during prop 8 and awkward social settings with non-members...but all of those sacrifices were worth it as long as I believed that the church was all it claimed to be...but when that all fell apart...it became a burden and I was glad to rid myself of it 

[Kevin Christensen]

Regarding the Deutero Isaiah, I offered some perspectives here:

http://publications.mi.byu.edu/fullscreen/?pub=2694&index=7

A key point is the that some scholars believe that Second Isaiah was based on the liturgy of a pre-exilic festival, and it turns out that Jacob quotes his Deutero Isaiah chapters in that context.  Such things suggest to me that it's not just a matter of modern scholarship raising issues for the Book of Mormon, but the Book of Mormon often raises issues for modern scholarship.   And I found it interesting.  We don't need to fret about the chapters that the Book of Mormon does not quote, only the ones it does.

To which I add reference to Barker on The Original Setting of the Fourth Servant Song:

http://www.margaretbarker.com/Papers/FourthServantSong.pdf

She makes a very good case based on a wide range of evidence, both textual and archeological.  And this in the face of her own use of the multiple Isaiah hypothesis in The Older Testament and her Eerdman's Isaiah commentary.

And I'd also point to Brant's discussion of translation issues in A Reason For Faith, which is very good.  And Joseph Spencer's An Other Testament, which goes into the complexities and subtleties of Isaiah in the Book of Mormon. 

FWIW

Kevin Christensen

Canonsburg, PA

 

[JLHPROF]

11 minutes ago, jkwilliams said:

Yeah, that is an extreme reaction. I can't imagine a life as bad as you describe, and I'm one who suffers from pretty bad depression. Even if there is nothing after death, there is plenty to celebrate and to love about life. We only waste our effort if we choose to.

Yes, of course there are good things in life.
But I still believe a confirmed 100% provable absence of God would make suicide rates increase, and would make suicide much more socially acceptable.

Atheism makes death a way out in a way that religion doesn't.  It allows for a life that has become too painful, pointless, and ugly to end with no worry about what comes next.  If we suffered as Job did and there was no God, why would we continue?

[jkwilliams]

1 minute ago, JLHPROF said:

Yes, of course there are good things in life.
But I still believe a confirmed 100% provable absence of God would make suicide rates increase, and would make suicide much more socially acceptable.

Atheism makes death a way out in a way that religion doesn't.  It allows for a life that has become too painful, pointless, and ugly to end with no worry about what comes next.  If we suffered as Job did and there was no God, why would we continue?

That's not much of an endorsement for religion. It's sort of the same thing as Thomas Hardy's "Hap":

If but some vengeful god would call to me 
From up the sky, and laugh: “Thou suffering thing, 
Know that thy sorrow is my ecstasy, 
That thy love's loss is my hate's profiting!” 

Then would I bear it, clench myself, and die, 
Steeled by the sense of ire unmerited; 
Half-eased in that a Powerfuller than I 
Had willed and meted me the tears I shed. 

But not so. How arrives it joy lies slain, 
And why unblooms the best hope ever sown? 
—Crass Casualty obstructs the sun and rain, 
And dicing Time for gladness casts a moan. . . . 
These purblind Doomsters had as readily strown 
Blisses about my pilgrimage as pain.

[Nevo]

12 hours ago, rongo said:

Why? Isn't your answer to this really just another matter of opinion on which reasonable minds can disagree?

When I say that I don't think Sperry is a very reliable guide to the Deutero-Isaiah issue, I'm not questioning his competence or fairness. For what it was, I think his article "The 'Isaiah Problem' in the Book of Mormon" was well done. But it's quite dated now. And due to the constraints of the format, Sperry could only briefly treat the critical arguments for multiple authorship. As a popular account of the state of the question 100 years ago, it's fine, but for people looking at the issue today there are much better sources out there (such as the commentaries of Joseph Blenkinsopp and Shalom Paul).

Sperry wrote in 1939 that "many great scholars through the years have held that the book of Isaiah is a unity, and have shown that the 'critical' hypothesis is far from being proved. Unless criticism can prove beyond reasonable doubt that Isaiah is not a unity, Latter-day Saints are justified in assuming that the traditional views held by the Book of Mormon with respect to its authorship are on the whole correct."

The current scholarly consensus is that the hypothesis has been demonstrated beyond a reasonable doubt. Konrad Schmid, for example, has called it "among the most solid results of historical-critical scholarship" (Schmid, The Old Testament: A Literary History, trans. Linda M. Maloney [Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 2012], 131). Marc Zvi Brettler has gone so far as to say that scholars are "certain" of it (Brettler, How to Read the Bible [Philadelphia: The Jewish Publication Society, 2005], 201).

If it were possible for Sperry to revisit the question in 2016, I'm not sure that he would still maintain that the hypothesis "is far from being proved." Grant Hardy, for his part, has recently remarked that "the presence of Second Isaiah in Nephi’s writings is one of the greatest challenges to claims of historicity . . . the lengthy quotations of Second Isaiah in 1 Nephi 20–21, borrowed from the King James Bible, can’t simply be artifacts of the translation since they have been modified in ways that are integral to the narrative" ("Understanding Understanding the Book of Mormon: An Interview with Grant Hardy," Journal of Book of Mormon Studies 25 [2016]: 29).

 

Quote

Nevo, do you believe that there were actual brass plates (and gold plates)? Do you believe that Lehi and Nephi were real people who really existed, for that matter? I think people's actual response to these questions is a "key indicator" of where they fall on the "Isaiah question."

The short answer is no. For many years—decades, in fact—I held to Blake Ostler's expansion theory as the best explanation for the ancient and modern elements I thought I detected in the text. I'd still like to believe that the Book of Mormon is some sort of ancient-modern hybrid but I am increasingly coming to see it as a wholly modern production. As things stand now, I have a good deal more confidence in critical biblical scholarship's take on Deutero-Isaiah than I do in the historicity of the Book of Mormon. But for believers like yourself who are convinced that the Book of Mormon is ancient, I can see why the "Isaiah problem" would be a non-issue.

 

Edited June 29, 2016 by Nevo

[Gray]

21 minutes ago, JLHPROF said:

Yes, of course there are good things in life.
But I still believe a confirmed 100% provable absence of God would make suicide rates increase, and would make suicide much more socially acceptable.

Atheism makes death a way out in a way that religion doesn't.  It allows for a life that has become too painful, pointless, and ugly to end with no worry about what comes next.  If we suffered as Job did and there was no God, why would we continue?

I think on the contrary, the view that there is no afterlife (which is not necessarily atheistic nor is it limited to atheists) puts all the focus and importance on the here and now. We tend to value more that which is in limited supply. 

Edited June 29, 2016 by Gray

[bluebell]

1 minute ago, Gray said:

I think on the contrary, the view that there is no afterlife (which is not necessarily atheistic nor is it limited to atheists) puts all the focus and importance on the here and now. We tend to value more that which is in limited supply. 

Unless we believe that what is in limited supply is misery and suffering.