Darren10 Posted March 5, 2017 Share Posted March 5, 2017 (edited) 33 minutes ago, Johnnie Cake said: Whoa, if I said that I'd get banned Thanks. I just corrected that last sentence. Edited March 5, 2017 by Darren10 Link to comment
Popular Post Kevin Christensen Posted March 5, 2017 Popular Post Share Posted March 5, 2017 (edited) On 3/4/2017 at 3:50 PM, clarkgoble said: As I mentioned earlier what doesn't get mentioned in the Book of Mormon is pretty interesting. They tend to be the parts of deutero-Isaiah that are the key parts dated to during or after the exile. While 52:1-10 and parts of 49 are perhaps still problematic, they are far less problematic. I also think they'd fit for the general time frame of when Zedekiah was set up by the Babylonians as ruler under their direction but before their second sacking of Jerusalem and the total exile. That's an interesting theory, although the bigger question is why Zedekiah would do that. The question of who Laban is also tends to be a mystery. I confess I always liked the idea that Laban was an escaped elite from the norther kingdom and that the brass plates were from the royalty there. That not to say that perhaps Zedekiah wanted it as a gift, but I can't see him commissioning it as a gift when he's from the southern tradition and more apt to be following the D tradition rather than the E tradition. Although as I said I don't buy all Barker's interpretation of D that have been popular among some apologists. I think Jeremiah's own connection to both D and Josiah is too complicated. (As I recall Hamblin makes a similar argument) Of course if deutero-Isaiah is a contemporary of Lehi, perhaps even writing the prose commentary on proto-Isaiah (that some attribute to the time of Josiah or even later) then perhaps what we have are scrolls still under development rather than a single codex, as I mentioned. In that case you might be completely right that Isaiah 49-52 was recently put on the plates/scrollls. Perhaps that's even why they're so important to Nephi since they represent a contemporary of his father's. (The question about why Jeremiah is so neglected is then interesting though) This actually fits the timeframe of Lehi according to popular contemporary theories on the origin of proto-Isaiah which date the poetry to the time of Isaiah and the prose to commentaries on it around the time of Josiah. Nephi, Jacob and centuries later Abinadi are following this same tradition. My theory (close to Ben McGuire's) is that the Brass Plates were done during the reign of Jehoiakim, the son of Josiah put in place by the Egyptians, which means that compared to Zedekiah, put in power by Babylon, he had far better reasons to produce something like the Brass plates, using reformed Egyptian. And one obvious reform would be towards making it easier to write. The Septuagint itself, recall, was commissioned by a later Egyptian King, for purposes of prestige, for the royal library, and as a resource for training civil servants and diplomats assigned to Israel. And I have responded to Hamblin, in defense of Barker. http://www.mormoninterpreter.com/prophets-and-kings-in-lehis-jerusalem-and-margaret-barkers-temple-theology/ Her chapter on Jeremiah in The Mother of the Lord vol 1. cuts some new ground. Regarding the Isaiah in the Book of Mormon, I did write a chapter on the topic in Paradigms Regained. http://publications.mi.byu.edu/fullscreen/?pub=2694&index=7 Of particular interest to me, besides some cool observation in the Isaiah in the Book of Mormon book from FARMS, involved notice that Deutero Isaiah chapters that Barker described in The Older Testament as marking a deliberate shift to strict monotheism do not appear in the Book of Mormon. Writing it now, I would also mention Barker's fascinating essay on The Fourth Servant Song (Isaiah 53) as composed by First Isaiah on the occasion of Hezekiah's bout with the plague. Notice tha http://www.margaretbarker.com/Papers/FourthServantSong.pdf Thus far, I've never heard any response to this paper by those bringing up the Deutero-Isaiah question regarding the Book of Mormon. Barker makes use of three Isaiahs in The Older Testament, and that work led to her being invited to write on Isaiah for the Eerdman's Commentary on the Bible. Read the paper, and consider how long it would take, using the methods and assumptions behind the Deutero-Isaiah dating, to uncover and account for the observations that Barker makes in her paper. Every critical tool excludes some issues while focusing on others. I mentioned this in 2010 in Hindsight on a Book of Mormon Historicity Critique: http://publications.mi.byu.edu/fullscreen/?pub=1467&index=7 Quote Her abstract states the following: Hezekiah had a potentially fatal boil which suggests that he had bubonic plague. This also destroyed the Assyrian army threatening Jerusalem. The king made a miraculous recovery. Isaiah first predicted that the king would die for his sin (of destroying the high places) but he then promised recovery. The prophet’s two explanations of the king’s suffering inspired the Fourth Servant Song, which depicted the suffering servant first as a sinner and then as the sin bearer. This is evidence for a sin-bearing priest-king, and for Isaiah’s hostility to the so-called ‘reforms’ of the cult. Evidence from Lachish and ancient eclipses supports this reconstruction, and so calls into question the suggestion that it was a later fiction.50 While not written with the Book of Mormon in mind, and not solving all questions about a Second Isaiah, Barker’s case that Isaiah 53 was written about Hezekiah suggests that it was originally composed by Isaiah of Jerusalem. Serendipitously, this makes the text available to Abinadi via the brass plates and thus improves the case for the Book of Mormon. Furthermore, the same essay answers some of Russell’s objections about Christian use of the Fourth Servant Song as a prophecy of Jesus. Barker shows the relationship between Hezekiah’s illness and the role of the high priest on the Day of Atonement: “How, then,” she asks, “could Hezekiah’s affliction, which had first been interpreted as punishment, be seen instead as a sign of salvation?” She cites the stories in Numbers 16:46 and Numbers 25:13, where in both cases “atonement protected against the wrath of plague, and the ritual was performed by the high priest.” Hezekiah’s illness and recovery, together with Isaiah’s interpretations of the affliction, are recorded in the Fourth Servant Song. Hezekiah’s illness did not give rise to the idea of a ‘suffering servant’, a sin bearer, a wrath interceptor like Aaron, but rather Isaiah’s second interpretation of the king’s illness was understood in the light of such a belief. In other words, the suffering figure, the wrath interceptor, was part of the ancient understanding of atonement and the role of the king. The Fourth Servant Song contains not only elements of the underlying ideology which enabled Isaiah to make the second interpretation of the king’s illness but also elements which reflect the actual circumstances of Hezekiah’s situation. The clearest link between the Hezekiah incident and the Fourth Servant Song is the fact that Isaiah gave two interpretations of the suffering. At first he deemed the plague a punishment and then he saw it as the sign of salvation. In the Song the suffering figure is at first despised because he is deemed to be punished by God, ‘smitten by God and afflicted’, ‘a man of pain and sickness’ (Isa. 53.3–4). Then the poet realizes that the suffering figure is not being punished for his own sins, but for the sins of others ‘has borne our sicknesses and pains’. The change in the Song is exactly the change in Isaiah’s interpretation of Hezekiah’s illness.51 Is this reconstruction, seeing Hezekiah having the bubonic plague, historically plausible? There is evidence outside the texts themselves to make what I propose a possibility. The strange story of the reversing shadow could be linked to a dateable eclipse of the sun, the mass burials at Lachish are most likely to have been plague victims, and the Lachish Letters just might have been written in this time of distress. Apart from this, there are enough details in the texts themselves which are inexplicable if Hezekiah did not have the bubonic plague. All the rest of what I propose could then follow. On the other hand, if the story of the king’s sickness was a later addition to the story of the deliverance of Jerusalem, and that story in itself was a pious fiction, it was all very skillfully done, with plenty of false clues left in the text, and we need to find another explanation for the mass burials at Lachish.52 The Fourth Servant Song, then, is tied to the role of the high priest on the Day of Atonement. Barker has elsewhere shown how Jesus came to see himself in that role. Regarding Christian use of Isaiah, Barker observes: On the road to Emmaus, Jesus explained to the two disciples that it was necessary for the Anointed One to suffer and enter his glory (Luke 24:26); this must refer to the Qumran version of the fourth Servant Song [Isaiah 53], since there is no other passage in the Hebrew Scriptures which speaks of a suffering Anointed One.53 This is but one example of Barker’s demonstration that the Hebrew scriptures that the Christians knew were different than the Masoretic Hebrew that we have now. Some of the vagueness that Russell sees in the Hebrew scripture appears to have been put there by Jewish editors in response to the rise of Christianity. The story that Barker tells about how the text and the context of Hebrew scriptures changed after the rise of Christianity, and at whose hands, is remarkably like the prophecy in 1 Nephi 13.54 She observes that the distribution of unreadable Hebrew texts is not random; they are texts which bear upon the Christian tradition. Add to these examples the variants in Isaiah about the Messiah, the variants in Deuteronomy 32 about the sons of God, and there is a case to answer. These are instances where traces remain. We can never know what has completely disappeared.55 Barker shows how Jerome successfully pushed for the Christian adoption of this altered Hebrew canon. She also observes that “all the texts in the chosen canon would have had an original context, which presupposed a certain pattern of shared beliefs within which the text was set. The context was as much as part of the meaning as the words themselves. Set in a new context, the same text would soon acquire a new meaning.” 56 The lost texts and lost context that Barker explores point to the world of the first temple, Lehi’s world of 600 BC Writing on Isaiah in the Book of Mormon now, I would also mention Joseph Spencer's interesting comments on how Nephi structures his work with a pattern of Creation, Fall, Atonement, Veil, summarized in the first verses that provides a pattern and key for the whole work. Spencer himself was startled to read Barker's Temple Theology and finding a very close match in her section titles, Creation Covenant, Atonement, Wisdom.(See An Other Testament, 49). I notice that those who enjoy prodding Mormons with the Deutero Isaiah issue, as though we were in denial and refusing to face the issues, never bring up the kinds of things I do here. There seems to be a reluctance to notice, to discuss, to change the game. I wasn't impressed by Kent Jackon's essay on Isaiah in the Book of Mormon in A Reason for Faith. A lot more could be said and done. FWIW Kevin Christensen Bethel Park, PA Edited March 10, 2017 by Kevin Christensen grammar 7 Link to comment
Gray Posted March 5, 2017 Share Posted March 5, 2017 13 hours ago, The Nehor said: I highly recommend the "seeing the visions of eternity" thing. It has a lot of history in there. Not history. Theology, eschatology, apocalypse, sacred legends, doctrine and things of that nature, but so far no history has been revealed using that method. 1 Link to comment
Gray Posted March 5, 2017 Share Posted March 5, 2017 1 hour ago, The Nehor said: Augustine already tried that. Only if Crossan had access to a time machine, somehow. Link to comment
The Nehor Posted March 5, 2017 Share Posted March 5, 2017 (edited) 4 hours ago, Gray said: Only if Crossan had access to a time machine, somehow. He might have. Augustine thought that he could give the gospel armor against every attack from every angle. From scholars to philosophers to pagans. He tried and he did a pretty good job. I just don't think the gospel survived the procedure required. 4 hours ago, Gray said: Not history. Theology, eschatology, apocalypse, sacred legends, doctrine and things of that nature, but so far no history has been revealed using that method. What if I were to tell you that in 3400 BCE a herder first contacted Azathoth and swore his soul to the daemon sultan and that I learned this via revelation? Now, it is history if true. Admittedly most people would not believe it so it is not verifiable history beyond my witness but I know WHAT I SAW!!!! Edited March 6, 2017 by The Nehor 1 Link to comment
Gray Posted March 5, 2017 Share Posted March 5, 2017 24 minutes ago, The Nehor said: What if I were to tell you that in 3400 BCE a herder first contacted the Azathoth and swore his soul to the daemon sultan and that I learned this via revelation? Now, it is history if true. Admittedly most people would not believe it so it is not verifiable history beyond my witness but I know WHAT I SAW!!!! He's a witch! Burn him!!!! 1 Link to comment
Darren10 Posted March 6, 2017 Share Posted March 6, 2017 1 hour ago, Gray said: He's a witch! Burn him!!!! 1 Link to comment
clarkgoble Posted March 6, 2017 Share Posted March 6, 2017 (edited) Kevin, doesn't Barker's thesis primarily account for the Isaiah that Abinadi quotes but not the passages (49-52:2) that Nephi/Jacob quote? Also while Barker's is a defensible reading, it hasn't really caught on has it? (Recognizing here the problem between what is defensible versus socially persuasive in the scholarly community) As you mention in your "Paradigms Regained" she accepts the traditional dating for the Nephi/Jacob quotations so I think those still need to be addressed, although as I said I think those can be dealt with. As I said an interesting thing critics leave out is the significance of the parts of deutero-Isaiah not quoted. Those tend to be the strongest passages for an exile dating. Edited March 6, 2017 by clarkgoble Link to comment
The Nehor Posted March 6, 2017 Share Posted March 6, 2017 3 hours ago, Gray said: He's a witch! Burn him!!!! Harsh but fair. 1 Link to comment
Kevin Christensen Posted March 6, 2017 Share Posted March 6, 2017 1 hour ago, clarkgoble said: Kevin, doesn't Barker's thesis primarily account for the Isaiah that Abinadi quotes but not the passages (49-52:2) that Nephi/Jacob quote? Also while Barker's is a defensible reading, it hasn't really caught on has it? (Recognizing here the problem between what is defensible versus socially persuasive in the scholarly community) As you mention in your "Paradigms Regained" she accepts the traditional dating for the Nephi/Jacob quotations so I think those still need to be addressed, although as I said I think those can be dealt with. As I said an interesting thing critics leave out is the significance of the parts of deutero-Isaiah not quoted. Those tend to be the strongest passages for an exile dating. Regarding the implications of defensible versus socially persuasive in a scholarly community, see Barker here: http://christpantokrator.blogspot.com/search/label/Barker%3A 'Being an Independent Scholar' And that context, is where Goff on positivism is particularly enlightening. If a community admits the the implications of the critical position, it is open to criticism. If a community assumes that what they do is "objectively facing facts and following them to a logical conclusion" the implications of their position, all too regularly, logical positivism, they conceal the implications of that position from themselves. There is a huge difference between criticizing Barker, for instance, as "Not us" and actually defending the question of "Why us?" on grounds that are not self referential, that is, the orthodoxy of a specific school of thought. Best, Kevin Christensen Bethel Park, PA 3 Link to comment
clarkgoble Posted March 6, 2017 Share Posted March 6, 2017 2 hours ago, Kevin Christensen said: Regarding the implications of defensible versus socially persuasive in a scholarly community, see Barker here: http://christpantokrator.blogspot.com/search/label/Barker%3A 'Being an Independent Scholar' And that context, is where Goff on positivism is particularly enlightening. If a community admits the the implications of the critical position, it is open to criticism. If a community assumes that what they do is "objectively facing facts and following them to a logical conclusion" the implications of their position, all too regularly, logical positivism, they conceal the implications of that position from themselves. There is a huge difference between criticizing Barker, for instance, as "Not us" and actually defending the question of "Why us?" on grounds that are not self referential, that is, the orthodoxy of a specific school of thought. While Alan and I have a lot of views in common I actually think he pushes things a tad too far for my comfort. We can reject a thoroughgoing positivism but still recognize that in whole, some positions have much more evidence and argumentative strength for them. But at the same time one doesn't have to read much of the literature to recognize most of the claims in these historical fields are highly underdetermined. Agreement seems more tied to a social consensus not always backed up by the evidence. That may not be as apparent to non-specialists who often can't quite understand that different fields have different degrees of strength for their conclusions. These areas of history seem at their best much weaker than say the typical paper in the field of physics. Link to comment
Gray Posted March 6, 2017 Share Posted March 6, 2017 14 hours ago, The Nehor said: Harsh but fair. That's my motto. Or if I can't do both, I at least try to live up to the first half of that. Link to comment
PeterPear Posted March 10, 2017 Share Posted March 10, 2017 On 3/5/2017 at 3:35 AM, Bobbieaware said: Do you understand I was being sarcastic and that I'm on your side? You, apparently, are the second person who took what I wrote seriously when I thought it was quite obvious I was using sarcasm to make a point. Ha ha! I did understand you were on my side. I apologize if you didn't think I was. I was agreeing by being sarcastic in return, regarding "scholars." (Our Church wasn't founded by a scholar, I don't need them to know the truth.) Link to comment
Benjamin McGuire Posted March 10, 2017 Share Posted March 10, 2017 Quote Kevin, doesn't Barker's thesis primarily account for the Isaiah that Abinadi quotes but not the passages (49-52:2) that Nephi/Jacob quote? Also while Barker's is a defensible reading, it hasn't really caught on has it? (Recognizing here the problem between what is defensible versus socially persuasive in the scholarly community) As you mention in your "Paradigms Regained" she accepts the traditional dating for the Nephi/Jacob quotations so I think those still need to be addressed, although as I said I think those can be dealt with. As I said an interesting thing critics leave out is the significance of the parts of deutero-Isaiah not quoted. Those tend to be the strongest passages for an exile dating. As a side note (and not really related to the current discussion), there is this fascinating interplay between Abinadi, Alma (later writings) and Nephi/Jacob. There is a lot of intertextual reference between Alma and Abinadi, and Alma and Nephi/Jacob. There is very, very little between Abinadi, and Nephi/Jacob. This is interesting to me both from the position that this is seen in the historical narrative that the text presents (that the small plates are not in public circulation until after they are given to Benjamin - and so wouldn't have been available to Abinadi), and it is interesting from the perspective that in the translation chronology, the small plates come last. Ben McGuire 4 Link to comment
clarkgoble Posted March 10, 2017 Share Posted March 10, 2017 3 hours ago, Benjamin McGuire said: As a side note (and not really related to the current discussion), there is this fascinating interplay between Abinadi, Alma (later writings) and Nephi/Jacob. There is a lot of intertextual reference between Alma and Abinadi, and Alma and Nephi/Jacob. There is very, very little between Abinadi, and Nephi/Jacob. This is interesting to me both from the position that this is seen in the historical narrative that the text presents (that the small plates are not in public circulation until after they are given to Benjamin - and so wouldn't have been available to Abinadi), and it is interesting from the perspective that in the translation chronology, the small plates come last. Abinadi is just a complete mystery. Where does he come from? What's his religious tradition? Why does he care about Noah and his priests? He's by far the most fascinating figure in the Book of Mormon. The biggest question is what records does he have access to? He quotes extensively from deutero-Isaiah to Noah and his priests. But does that mean he had access to the brass plates and was part of an inner circle? What does this say about copies of the brass plates? So many questions and so few answers. Regarding the textual question on the large plates and small plates, critics would note 1 Nephi - Jacob is translated last and that's why there's no connection. But of course whatever is on the 116 pages would have been known in the fraud model. Likewise if it was written as it went along, it'd be a perfect way to add prophecy into the small plates that would be referenced in Mosiah/Alma. That this doesn't happen is actually pretty intriguing as you note. 2 Link to comment
notHagoth7 Posted March 11, 2017 Share Posted March 11, 2017 On 3/3/2017 at 9:59 AM, Johnnie Cake said: This may be kicking a dead horse...this particular difficulty is at or near the top of a very very deep pile of perceived problems. ...so Bokovoy's argument...confirms my reasons for non-believe...but leaves me with a path to belief that does not work for me. I should also add that anyone who proposes that the Biblical scholars are wrong and that the proof is in the fact that the Book of Mormon its self is proof that Deutero Isaiah was written before Lehi left Jerusalem because of the fact that it is in the Book of Mormon and thus must have been on the Brass Plates...sorry that dog won't hunt. The horse ain't dead. It's a prancing white unicorn...with wings. Johnnie, the critics who proposed (and those who still propose) that the last portions of Isaiah were supposedly written long after Isaiah's death did so mostly because of explicit prophecies in those chapters which require God knowing/sharing with mankind what would play out in the future. For example, the chapter which names Cyrus by name...long before his birth. In essence, the critics didn't believe in such a God, or in the nature of prophecy, so from their fractured foundation, they taught that the most prophetic passages must somehow have been written after the events foretold. They were wrong. They attempted much the same with the most prophetic portions of Daniel. Attempting to question/dilute God's foreknowledge and promises. No go. Isaiah and Daniel actually were/are prophets...just as Jesus of Nazareth attested. And it is our duty/privilege to prayerfully study/understand the promises contained in their writings - because those promises pertain to us. James 1:5. Isaiah 53, for example, is the counterpart to the messianic timeline in Daniel 9. By divine design. As Isaac Newton said centuries ago: " Daniel is most distinct in order of time, and easiest to be understood, and therefore in those things which relate to the last times, he must be made the key to the rest." In closing, as to whether the dog will hunt. I've heard that the dog prefers, for some reason, to sit and bark as the caravan rolls on. (I suggest that it instead hop on board and enjoy the unfolding panorama.) :0) 2 Link to comment
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