Old testament and Book of Mormon Prophets

[snowflake]

The prophets in the BOM before the arrival of the messiah can be quoted as calling him Jesus Christ. Nephi, King Benjamin, Alma and Heleman all use the specific name of Jesus hundreds of years before his arrival in the Americas.  When comparing this to the OT prophets of the Bible, the specific name of Jesus is never mentioned.  I find this very intriguing, any ideas why the OT Biblical prophets were not given the specific name of Jesus as opposed to the Prophets in the BOM?    

Edited July 27, 2016 by Nemesis
Banning posters from thread

[Gray]

A few possible explanations:

• Moroni modified previous records to reflect the name
• Joseph Smith opted to translate something like "Messiah"  into "Jesus Christ"
• The Book of Mormon was composed by Joseph Smith

[RevTestament]

15 minutes ago, snowflake said:

The prophets in the BOM before the arrival of the messiah can be quoted as calling him Jesus Christ. Nephi, King Benjamin, Alma and Heleman all use the specific name of Jesus hundreds of years before his arrival in the Americas.  When comparing this to the OT prophets of the Bible, the specific name of Jesus is never mentioned.  I find this very intriguing, any ideas why the OT Biblical prophets were not given the specific name of Jesus as opposed to the Prophets in the BOM?    

Not really  but Jesus said Abraham rejoiced to see His day. THE NT says if the people knew they were crucifying their Lord, they wouldn't have done it, which would have frustrated the plan.

1 Corinthians 2:8

8 Which none of the princes of this world knew: for had they known it, they would not have crucified the Lord of glory.

[snowflake]

4 minutes ago, RevTestament said:

Not really  but Jesus said Abraham rejoiced to see His day. THE NT says if the people knew they were crucifying their Lord, they wouldn't have done it, which would have frustrated the plan.

1 Corinthians 2:8

8 Which none of the princes of this world knew: for had they known it, they would not have crucified the Lord of glory.

Not sure if I was clear in the OP. If you put the name of Jesus into a bible search, the name is not seen before the gospels.  In the BOM the name of Jesus is given many times by many Prophets before the arrival of Jesus.  My specific question is to why was the name Jesus given to the BOM prophets and not to the OT prophets?

[Atheist Mormon]

27 minutes ago, snowflake said:

The prophets in the BOM before the arrival of the messiah can be quoted as calling him Jesus Christ. Nephi, King Benjamin, Alma and Heleman all use the specific name of Jesus hundreds of years before his arrival in the Americas.  When comparing this to the OT prophets of the Bible, the specific name of Jesus is never mentioned.  I find this very intriguing, any ideas why the OT Biblical prophets were not given the specific name of Jesus as opposed to the Prophets in the BOM?    

Well Snowflake, therein lies your answer................."I find this very intriguing,"  .......

There's no intrigue.....There's no mystery... It's all spawned by fantasy...Layer upon layer....

[snowflake]

Quote

1 minute ago, Atheist Mormon said:

Well Snowflake, therein lies your answer................."I find this very intriguing,"  .......

There's no intrigue.....There's no mystery... It's all spawned by fantasy...Layer upon layer....

You're not helping, Atheist Mormon! LOL.

 

[RevTestament]

15 minutes ago, snowflake said:

Not sure if I was clear in the OP. If you put the name of Jesus into a bible search, the name is not seen before the gospels.  In the BOM the name of Jesus is given many times by many Prophets before the arrival of Jesus.  My specific question is to why was the name Jesus given to the BOM prophets and not to the OT prophets?

I did answer it. If the Old Testament prophets had called him Jesus and been more specific, then there would have been no question that the man Jesus was the Messiah per Daniel 9 and it would have been basically impossible for him to be crucified by Mosaic leaders. Jesus laid down his life and that was part of the plan for him to teach them who he was and for things to proceed based on faith rather than very specific prophecies.

[Atheist Mormon]

31 minutes ago, snowflake said:

You're not helping, Atheist Mormon! LOL.

Sorry Snow, I tried to shorten you Quest by million miles, realizing it is not fun face reality so soon.

[Kevin Christensen]

1 hour ago, snowflake said:

The prophets in the BOM before the arrival of the messiah can be quoted as calling him Jesus Christ. Nephi, King Benjamin, Alma and Heleman all use the specific name of Jesus hundreds of years before his arrival in the Americas.  When comparing this to the OT prophets of the Bible, the specific name of Jesus is never mentioned.  I find this very intriguing, any ideas why the OT Biblical prophets were not given the specific name of Jesus as opposed to the Prophets in the BOM?    

Yeshua = Joshua = Jesus.

Also consider that Joseph Smith is translating the Book of Mormon according to his language and learning.

And try things like this:

Quote

Professor Givens spoke of Joseph Smith’s thoroughgoing endeavor to overturn the most sacred tenants of cultural Christianity; and one of these must be the identity of Yahweh the Lord who appears in the Old Testament as the God of Israel. New Testament scholars agonize over why the first Christians applied Old Testament Yahweh texts to Jesus. How, they ask, could the early Christian teachers—all of them—have found Jesus in the Old Testament? (When I wrote a book setting out all this rather obvious evidence, it was regarded as strange and hopelessly radical.)

Another example: The Jerusalem Bible, which is the translation prepared by the Roman Catholic Church, leaves the name Yahweh in the Old Testament instead of using the customary form, “the LORD” but then has “the LORD” in the New Testament. One editorial decision broke the link between the Old Testament and the New and obscured the fundamental proclamation of the first Christians: “Jesus is the Lord” – “Jesus is Yahweh.”

One more example: the new English translation of the Targum, which is the Aramaic version of the Old Testament, does not use the term “Messiah” in the Psalms when translating the Hebrew word “meshiah,” which means Messiah. The reason given is this, and I quote, “It does not seem appropriate to use words like ‘Messiah’ and ‘Messianic’ in connection with the Hebrew text of the Old Testament.” (That was published last year.)

It was my challenge to assumptions such as these, which simply ignore the evidence of both the Hebrew Bible and of early Christian writings, that led to my first contact with Mormon scholars.

The original temple tradition was that Yahweh the Lord was the son of God Most high, present on earth in the Messiah. This means that the older religion in Israel would have taught about the Messiah, and so, finding Christ in the Old Testament is exactly what we should expect, but something obscured by incorrect reading of the scriptures. And this, I suggest, is one aspect of the restoration of the “plain and precious things” which have been taken away.

http://www.joehunt.org/joseph-smith-margaret-barker-talk.html

And this, from me:

http://publications.mi.byu.edu/fullscreen/?pub=1459&index=4

FWIW

Kevin Christensen

Canonsburg, PA

[ksfisher]

The appearance of the name Jesus Christ, a Greek name, would seem to have been introduced by Joseph Smith in the translation process.  Book of Mormon writers would have known the Savior by whatever name they called him in the language they spoke.

Calling the Savior Jesus Christ in the Book of Mormon would seem to be appropriated.  The book the Joseph Smith translated was produced for a modern audience, so a name that modern people were familiar with was used.

[JLHPROF]

1 hour ago, Atheist Mormon said:

Well Snowflake, therein lies your answer................."I find this very intriguing,"  .......

There's no intrigue.....There's no mystery... It's all spawned by fantasy...Layer upon layer....

You keep posting the same claim on every thread and contributing nothing of substance to support your claim or to address the topics.
It's getting old.

[JLHPROF]

1 hour ago, Gray said:

• Moroni modified previous records to reflect the name
• Joseph Smith opted to translate something like "Messiah"  into "Jesus Christ"

I'll go with either of these.

Joseph Smith translated not by language (ie - book = libro) but by revelation.
If he was told to say/write Christ that's what he wrote.  If he was told to say/write Jesus that's what he wrote.

This is useful since idioms etc are hard to translate literally and Joseph alone certainly wouldn't have been able to linguistically translate them without the help of the spirit.

Edited July 27, 2016 by JLHPROF

[RevTestament]

1 hour ago, Kevin Christensen said:

Yeshua = Joshua = Jesus.

Also consider that Joseph Smith is translating the Book of Mormon according to his language and learning.

I have come to the conclusion that the most correct transliteration for Joshua is Yahoshuah. I would like your input on this as to whether Yeshua is more correct. I suppose this might depend on the transliteration system used. Nevertheless the two are pronounced differently.

I think the Lord basically translated the Book of Mormon into King James English because that was the language of the people. It would have been nice tho if the BOM had corrected the incorrect Jesus transliteration.

[ksfisher]

18 minutes ago, RevTestament said:

 

I think the Lord basically translated the Book of Mormon into King James English because that was the language of the people. It would have been nice tho if the BOM had corrected the incorrect Jesus transliteration.

You're assuming that a Nephite would have the same name for the Lord as a Jerusalem Hebrew.  While that was probably true for a number of years after the departure from Jerusalem, the further that event faded into the past the more likely the name would be changed based on the local language. 

In any event, the name Jesus Christ conveys perfectly to the modern reader the idea that the Savior is being referred to (as you state).

[RevTestament]

29 minutes ago, ksfisher said:

You're assuming that a Nephite would have the same name for the Lord as a Jerusalem Hebrew.  While that was probably true for a number of years after the departure from Jerusalem, the further that event faded into the past the more likely the name would be changed based on the local language. 

In any event, the name Jesus Christ conveys perfectly to the modern reader the idea that the Savior is being referred to (as you state).

I am not assuming that. I am assuming that the Lord translated the BOM characters into English for Joseph Smith, and that JS' own ideas and feelings had virtually nothing to do with what words appeared. In other words I don't think Yeshua appeared and that JS said "Jesus." I think "Jesus" was used because that is what was in the KJV used by the Church, and was what readers were familiar with as referring to the Savior. Nevertheless "Jesus" is a very poor transliteration for the correct Hebrew name, and also hides the symbolic nature of Joshua in the OT.

[ksfisher]

29 minutes ago, RevTestament said:

I am not assuming that. I am assuming that the Lord translated the BOM characters into English for Joseph Smith, and that JS' own ideas and feelings had virtually nothing to do with what words appeared. In other words I don't think Yeshua appeared and that JS said "Jesus." I think "Jesus" was used because that is what was in the KJV used by the Church, and was what readers were familiar with as referring to the Savior. Nevertheless "Jesus" is a very poor transliteration for the correct Hebrew name, and also hides the symbolic nature of Joshua in the OT.

I see where you're coming from, you believe in a tight translations method for the plates.

That being said, if you believe that it was the Lord doing the translating, then your critique of Jesus as a "very poor transliteration" would seem to imply that He is a poor translator.

Edited July 27, 2016 by ksfisher

[snowflake]

1 hour ago, JLHPROF said:

I'll go with either of these.

Joseph Smith translated not by language (ie - book = libro) but by revelation.
If he was told to say/write Christ that's what he wrote.  If he was told to say/write Jesus that's what he wrote.

This is useful since idioms etc are hard to translate literally and Joseph alone certainly wouldn't have been able to linguistically translate them without the help of the spirit.

Yeshua, Joshua, Jesus, the specific name is not found in the OT.  However we see the name Jesus throughout the BOM, multiple prophets starting with Nephi using the Greek name Jesus. We also see the word "Bible", very odd this word showing up at that time and place in history. 

Under the assumption that the BOM is what the LDS claim it to be, I understand why you would go with your two conclusions stated above.

 

[ksfisher]

8 minutes ago, snowflake said:

Yeshua, Joshua, Jesus, the specific name is not found in the OT.  However we see the name Jesus throughout the BOM, multiple prophets starting with Nephi using the Greek name Jesus. We also see the word "Bible", very odd this word showing up at that time and place in history. 

Under the assumption that the BOM is what the LDS claim it to be, I understand why you would go with your two conclusions stated above.

 

Why do you find it odd to see the word Bible in a translated document?  What word would you expect to see?

[JLHPROF]

11 minutes ago, snowflake said:

we see the name Jesus throughout the BOM, multiple prophets starting with Nephi using the Greek name Jesus. We also see the word "Bible", very odd this word showing up at that time and place in history.

No, you don't.
You see Joseph Smith being inspired to write "Jesus" as the English equivalent of whatever word Nephi wrote and Mormon abridged.

Quote

Under the assumption that the BOM is what the LDS claim it to be, I understand why you would go with your two conclusions stated above.

Because given what the spirit has witnessed to me concerning the Book of Mormon, they are the two most likely conclusions.  Other conclusions require me to ignore the spiritual evidence the Lord has given me.  Why would I ignore the Lord in favor of some academic issue?

[RevTestament]

36 minutes ago, ksfisher said:

I see where you're coming from, you believe in a tight translations method for the plates.

That being said, if you believe that it was the Lord doing the translating, then your critique of Jesus as a "very poor transliteration" would seem to imply that He is a poor translator.

I think the KJV translators were kind of poor translators. But that was the foundation for the Christianity of the 10 horns of Daniel, ie the Gentiles, who became the Europeans who would first convert to the Church. It is the English they knew and used. For the BOM to then change it all may have been a hindrance to their conversion. Not only does the BOM use the poor Jesus transliteration, but it also conforms to the LORD title instead of using Jehovah or YHWH/Yahowah. In a sense it doesn't really matter since the reader knows to whom it is referring. I don't know that the Lord was trying to be so precise as to teach English speaking peoples the correct way to pronounce Hebrew words or was more concerned with converting them to the truth using scriptures they were familiar with... which do you think?

[ksfisher]

5 minutes ago, RevTestament said:

I think the KJV translators were kind of poor translators. But that was the foundation for the Christianity of the 10 horns of Daniel, ie the Gentiles, who became the Europeans who would first convert to the Church. It is the English they knew and used. For the BOM to then change it all may have been a hindrance to their conversion. Not only does the BOM use the poor Jesus transliteration, but it also conforms to the LORD title instead of using Jehovah or YHWH/Yahowah. In a sense it doesn't really matter since the reader knows to whom it is referring. I don't know that the Lord was trying to be so precise as to teach English speaking peoples the correct way to pronounce Hebrew words or was more concerned with converting them to the truth using scriptures they were familiar with... which do you think?

I believe that the translation process was much looser that what you have stated.  Joseph worked with the Spirit, but it was not dictated too him.  I believe that Joseph was an active participant in the translation process.  Brant Gardner has written a wonderful book on this subject, it's worth the read if you haven't already.

http://gregkofford.com/products/the-gift-and-power

[RevTestament]

22 minutes ago, ksfisher said:

I believe that the translation process was much looser that what you have stated.  Joseph worked with the Spirit, but it was not dictated too him.  I believe that Joseph was an active participant in the translation process.  Brant Gardner has written a wonderful book on this subject, it's worth the read if you haven't already.

http://gregkofford.com/products/the-gift-and-power

Strange words like adieu showing up does lend to an impression that part of the translation process was dependent upon Joseph. The stone in hat testimony of Martin Harris largely suggests otherwise. I have a lot on my plate right now or otherwise I might look at that book, it might relate to some of the research I am doing a little. However, I think we are dealing basically with guesswork here.

[clarkgoble]

While I think the translation process was loose in terms of textual content I'm not sure that tells us much about the name. That is it seems like the Nephites take it as a new revelation what his name will be. That name as translated follow the KJV text though which is the Hebrew transliterated to Latin and then to English as Jesus. It's unclear what form it took for the Nephites but presumably it'd be the Hebrew form of Joshua. It's not clear however that no one in pre-exillic times had the name. After all even with Nephi it appears the texts available were under dispute. (This was the issue of the Deuteronomists and Josiah's reforms including finding "lost" scripture) I wouldn't be at all shocked to find it was known even if it wasn't known to Lehi or Nephi.

There's also a view that the Hebrew term for Salvation could be used in some places as Jesus' name. The name literally means YHWH is a saving cry or more generically "to rescue." Wikipedia actually has a surprisingly good article on the name. 

The one issue is that the detailed form Jesus' name took was kind of shortened and arose in the post-exilic period. Would that have been as significant to Nephi? Who knows. I confess it's not obvious as to why the name matters at all. My pet theory is, given Nephi's use of Isaiah, that he found the name as significant as a pun in terms of how he read the relevant Isaiah passages. (Although the form Isaiah takes, espeically deutero-Isaiah, is very colored by the KJV -- again I'm not sure the underlying texts Nephi was working off let alone what he inscribed on the plates lines up)

 

 

[theplains]

6 hours ago, snowflake said:

The prophets in the BOM before the arrival of the messiah can be quoted as calling him Jesus Christ. Nephi, King Benjamin, Alma and Heleman all use the specific name of Jesus hundreds of years before his arrival in the Americas.  When comparing this to the OT prophets of the Bible, the specific name of Jesus is never mentioned.  I find this very intriguing, any ideas why the OT Biblical prophets were not given the specific name of Jesus as opposed to the Prophets in the BOM?    

If Jesus really visited the Nephites somewhere in the 'Americas' , they might have used the reformed-Egyptian equivalent of 'Jesus'.

Jim

[Jeanne]

I haven't read this book..but how loose is this translation..what does it mean?