The beauty of scripture - OT

[Kevin Christensen]

Friedman, in Who Wrote the Bible? did make the case that P was Pre-exilic based on the evidence that, among other things, Jeremiah interacts with P.  (Some of us do carefully read things like that, and don't rely entirely on CES or Big Books of What to Think.)  As I recall, RT then pointed to scholars who say that that part of Jeremiah was post-exilic, which is a convenient way to deal with evidence that doesn't fit, given that we don't have originals of any of the documents involved (whether the hypothetical P, Jeremiah, Ezekiel, or the sources that they used which have not survived), and that the contextualizations are always based on incomplete information, and that reconstructions always involve unproven assumptions.  It's a reminder that "paradigms not only provide a map, but some of the directions for map making."   Given motivation and determination, one can explain away the Book of Mormon.  But in doing so, that does not mean that the explanation is correct. 

For a thought-provoking essay on just how much contextualization and framing matters to the results of Biblical scholarship, in this case, Life of Jesus Research, no matter how learned, footnoted, or popular, see: 

https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=2&ved=0CCMQFjABahUKEwi99cSFy_7GAhWXEZIKHXFdDi8&url=http%3A%2F%2Fstatic1.1.sqspcdn.com%2Fstatic%2Ff%2F38692%2F394611%2F1270557825007%2FJesus%2Bin%2BRecent%2BResearch.pdf%3Ftoken%3DaL8uUvY9XLYs48KRVVqPPpByuTc%3D&ei=edu3Vf3UOJejyATxurn4Ag&usg=AFQjCNGfSaGPO7NYAwM977u8eGB4drFpJQ&bvm=bv.98717601,d.aWw&cad=rja

It's worth comparing that essay to Bushman's comments at the 2005 Conference on Joseph Smith, noting how the same thing happens in Joseph Smith biography.

FWIW

Kevin Christensen

Canonsburg, PA

[Mormons Talk]

Could methods similar to those used in studies of the DH be used to uncover different sources in the BOM - both internal and external? For example, how do we know that Mormon didn't edit any of the material presented by him as being made by another's hand?  What areas of the BOM show clear intertextuality with the Bible? Are there areas of the Book of Mormon that were influenced in the translation process by theological ideas from the 19th century?  Seems like a fascinating area of inquiry.

[Calm]

Are you aware of wordprint studies showing different authors?  I only have a passing acquaintance, but this might be a good place to start to see if stuff has been done:

https://byustudies.byu.edu/charts/10-135-wordprints-and-book-mormon

[Mormons Talk]

11 hours ago, Calm said:

Are you aware of wordprint studies showing different authors?  I only have a passing acquaintance, but this might be a good place to start to see if stuff has been done:

https://byustudies.byu.edu/charts/10-135-wordprints-and-book-mormon

Yes, but my sense was that such stuff was unconfirmed and not really an active area of research.  The classic wordprint studies were done 20 - 30 years ago, and it doesn't seem like there's been much since.  Am I wrong about this?

[Mormons Talk]

11 hours ago, Calm said:

Are you aware of wordprint studies showing different authors?  I only have a passing acquaintance, but this might be a good place to start to see if stuff has been done:

https://byustudies.byu.edu/charts/10-135-wordprints-and-book-mormon

Speaking of wordprint studies - it seems like applying the the BOM wordprint techniques to the Pentateuch, and seeing how their results compare with the standard results of the Documentary hypothesis, would be a very interesting project to see how valid the techniques are.  Has anyone done this?