Evidence #1: Hebrew and Egyptian Wordplays

[jkwilliams]

3 minutes ago, clarkgoble said:

I think the analogy would be our country with a pocket of orthodox Jews in Brooklyn. With the equivalent of the surviving records we have for the Mayan how on earth could we tell? Even most of what characterizes these orthodox Jews is largely the material culture of the majority. 

The problem, of course, is that Orthodox Jews have not come to lead New York culturally, religiously, or politically, driving its development and progress. That's the argument the Kaminaljuyu folks are making: the small group came in, and because of their technologies or leadership abilities, quickly assumed leadership of the city and led the city for some 400 years. The narrative of large cities and major warfare makes no sense if the Nephites were a mere pocket within a larger culture because the text has Nephite culture, religion, and technology at the forefront of the civilization. The proponents of Kaminaljuyu seem to recognize this dilemma.

[Rajah Manchou]

32 minutes ago, jkwilliams said:

but it's the one city that would have been around at the time of Nephi. 

Well before the City of Nephi, which makes it a poor fit. There were no Jaredite cities south of the narrow neck. We shouldn't find large cities south of the narrow neck before 600 BCE. 

[jkwilliams]

Just now, Rajah Manchou said:

Well before the City of Nephi, which makes it a poor fit. There were no Jaredite cities south of the narrow neck. We shouldn't find large cities south of the narrow neck before 600 BCE. 

Exactly. To make it work, you have to have Nephi's small party walk into the center of a huge city, pitch their tents, and immediately start working with the inhabitants thereof to such an extent that they soon assume leadership over the city--all without mentioning anything about finding such a city. Mind you, the city had been around for some 900 years before the time of the Nephites, and it continued for roughly 1500 years after Mosiah is said to have fled the city. I don't see how it works. IMO, the only reason to propose Kaminaljuyu is that the text requires a large city, and that's the only one around at the time in question. But it's a terrible fit.

[Glenn101]

I think that we may all too often conflate two different types of evidence. One is direct or indirect evidence that the Book of Mormon is a historical document and the other is evidence of authorship. In my opinion, the evidence that Ryan has presented thus far is more of an authorship type rather than direct evidence of historicity. In other words, what I believe that Ryan's evidence tends to show is that the underlying document of the Book of Mormon was authored by an author or authors with an intimate knowledge of Egyptian and Hebrew languages but does not provide a discernible author or authors.

Joseph Smith has been recognized posthumously as having a really giant intellect (something that his contemporary critics never would have suspected), maybe to the point of being a super genius as the details of the complexity of the Book of Mormon have been revealed through ongoing research. It has been shown to be far from the "chloroform in print" that Mark Twain so (in)famously labeled. 

I do not believe that even the linguistic work that Brian Stubbs has done on Semitic roots in the UA language family is direct evidence for the Book of Mormon. It only provides one possible explanation of how the Semitic elements may have gotten there. 

One of the problems that most of the believers and critics both have that frequent this board is that most of us are not experts in any of the fields that relate to Book of Mormon scholarship. We do have people like Robert F. Smith though and he can articulate his points maybe too brilliantly for many of us to comprehend. I believe that is why some of the critics are not very impressed with some of the evidence that has been presented, i.e. they do not have enough expertise in most of the disciplines to be impressed. Of course they can exclaim that a TBM such as myself also does not have enough expertise to know how much weight to give to any bit of evidence in any one field. And there we really have to rely on experts in the field. Again, the problem the critics have is that the experts that have chimed in on the linguistic aspects of the Book of Mormon have been almost entirely LDS, but well qualified LDS scholars.

The heavy presence of Early Modern English provides prima facie evidence that the translator was facile in that dialect/vernacular to the point that it was second nature. Again, that leaves the question of just who the author or authors were unanswered. The conclusion that does support is that Joseph Smith nor any of his contemporaries were the actual author(s) of the text. The presence of the Early Modern English is something that even a non expert can confirm or refute by consulting sources such as the Oxford English dictionary. It is the conclusions that have been drawn from the research that has been done by Stanford Carmack and others that sit uncomfortably with the critics but as of yet there have been no experts come forward to contest Stanford's assertion that the level of EmodE in the Book of Mormon have to have been pretty much second nature to the person translating the Book of Mormon. It did not appear to have been part of Joseph Smith's normal dialect. This is only evidence against Joseph as being the author, but not evidence for historicity.

Glenn

[Ryan Dahle]

12 hours ago, Glenn101 said:

In my opinion, the evidence that Ryan has presented thus far is more of an authorship type rather than direct evidence of historicity. In other words, what I believe that Ryan's evidence tends to show is that the underlying document of the Book of Mormon was authored by an author or authors with an intimate knowledge of Egyptian and Hebrew languages but does not provide a discernible author or authors.

I think there are reasons that the authorship question on this issue is directly linked to the question of historicity. The fact is that if whoever authored the Book of Mormon had a deep knowledge of both Hebrew and Egyptian, then that provides support for Joseph Smith's claims on two fronts. It suggests he, with his limited education and experience, wasn't the author, which he said he wasn't. And it is consistent with his claim that it was written by ancient prophets trained in Hebrew and Egyptian. 

Were there individuals in Joseph Smith's day who would have been able to implement the type of Egyptian wordplays we see in the Book of Mormon? Perhaps. I actually am not sure on that point. But it seems highly unlikely that Joseph or anyone around him would have been able to do so. 

It is the historical documents which describe the coming forth of the Book of Mormon and its translation that make the Hebrew and Egyptian wordplays evidence for historicity. Not only is the presence of these wordplays in the text consistent with the claims of ancient authorship, but that is the only viable theory of authorship that they are consistent with. People can come up with all sorts of possible scenarios about how some other 19th century or 16th century individual or group was actually responsible for the English translation, but none of these theories can be supported by any substantive historical evidence, and they all face serious problems when confronted with the historical evidence we do have.

The only real contenders, as far as authorship theories go, are that Joseph Smith made it up and dictated it on the fly, or else the translation was revealed to him in a miraculous way, as he claimed, which would obviously lend considerable support to his claim of it being authored by ancient prophets trained in Hebrew and Egyptian. The presence of Hebrew and Egyptian wordplays, therefore, provide good evidence of ancient authorship and in turn good evidence that its historical content is authentically ancient as well.

 

[Rajah Manchou]

26 minutes ago, Ryan Dahle said:

Were there individuals in Joseph Smith's day who would have been able to implement the type of Egyptian wordplays we see in the Book of Mormon? Perhaps. I actually am not sure on that point. But it seems highly unlikely that Joseph or anyone around him would have been able to do so. 

The Smiths lived for several years just a few miles from the center of Hebrew studies in America, Dartmouth. Nearly everybody at Dartmouth learned, and spoke, Hebrew.

Biblical Hebrew in Colonial America: The Case of Dartmouth
Shalom Goldman
American Jewish History
Vol. 79, No. 2 (Winter 1989/1990), pp. 173-180

Dr. John Smith (a cousin of Joseph's grandfather) was a professor at Dartmouth and was New England's leading scholar in the Hebrew language. He wrote one of the first Hebrew Grammars in America. He also mastered Chaldaic, Arabic and Aramaic and other oriental languages. He was the college librarian, and was charged with collecting books on Biblical Hebrew. Both Ethan Smith and Solomon Spaulding were his students, and he had sent Solomon's good friend, Elijah Parish, to his hometown of Byfield to oversee the parish there. Elijah wrote detailed books on Biblical geography. 

There were plenty of people within 10 to 15 miles of the Smiths, even within the Smith family, that could have done what we assume couldn't have been done. Not saying that's what happened, but we need to accept that the Smiths weren't as isolated as we might think.

Edited July 7, 2018 by Rajah Manchou

[Ryan Dahle]

26 minutes ago, Rajah Manchou said:

43 minutes ago, Ryan Dahle said:

Were there individuals in Joseph Smith's day who would have been able to implement the type of Egyptian wordplays we see in the Book of Mormon? Perhaps. I actually am not sure on that point. But it seems highly unlikely that Joseph or anyone around him would have been able to do so. 

The Smiths lived for several years just a few miles from the center of Hebrew studies in America, Dartmouth. Nearly everybody at Dartmouth learned, and spoke, Hebrew.

Biblical Hebrew in Colonial America: The Case of Dartmouth
Shalom Goldman
American Jewish History
Vol. 79, No. 2 (Winter 1989/1990), pp. 173-180

Dr. John Smith (a cousin of Joseph's grandfather) was a professor at Dartmouth and was New England's leading scholar in the Hebrew language. He wrote one of the first Hebrew Grammars in America. He also mastered Chaldaic, Arabic and Aramaic and other oriental languages. He was the college librarian, and was charged with collecting books on Biblical Hebrew. Both Ethan Smith and Solomon Spaulding were his students, and he had sent Solomon's good friend, Elijah Parish, to his hometown of Byfield to oversee the parish there. Elijah wrote detailed books on Biblical geography. 

There were plenty of people within 10 to 15 miles of the Smiths, even within the Smith family, that could have done what we assume couldn't have been done. Not saying that's what happened, but we need to accept that the Smiths weren't as isolated as we might think.

I'm not sure if you noticed, but I was specifically talking about Egyptian wordplays. Also, the Dartmouth connection, although possible, is very tenuous. You would have to assume that Hyrum or some other family member obtained just the information needed to then pass on to Joseph Smith, so that he could then implement it into his text.

You have to assume either a very detailed conveyance of specific Hebrew features to Joseph, as well as an explanation about Hebrew punning, or else fraud, with Hyrum and/or another family member actually contributing to a hoax translation. It is a possibility, but a highly unlikely one based on the historical information we have available. And it doesn't explain the Egyptian wordplays. 

Edited July 7, 2018 by Ryan Dahle

[Glenn101]

55 minutes ago, Ryan Dahle said:

I think there are reasons that the authorship question on this issue is directly linked to the question of historicity. The fact is that if whoever authored the Book of Mormon had a deep knowledge of both Hebrew and Egyptian, then that provides support for Joseph Smith's claims on two fronts. It suggests he, with his limited education and experience, wasn't the author, which he said he wasn't. And it is consistent with his claim that it was written by ancient prophets trained in Hebrew and Egyptian. 

Were there individuals in Joseph Smith's day who would have been able to implement the type of Egyptian wordplays we see in the Book of Mormon? Perhaps. I actually am not sure on that point. But it seems highly unlikely that Joseph or anyone around him would have been able to do so. 

It is the historical documents which describe the coming forth of the Book of Mormon and its translation that make the Hebrew and Egyptian wordplays evidence for historicity. Not only is the presence of these wordplays in the text consistent with the claims of ancient authorship, but that is the only viable theory of authorship that they are consistent with. People can come up with all sorts of possible scenarios about how some other 19th century or 16th century individual or group was actually responsible for the English translation, but none of these theories can be supported by any substantive historical evidence, and they all face serious problems when confronted with the historical evidence we do have.

The only real contenders, as far as authorship theories go, are that Joseph Smith made it up and dictated it on the fly, or else the translation was revealed to him in a miraculous way, as he claimed, which would obviously lend considerable support to his claim of it being authored by ancient prophets trained in Hebrew and Egyptian. The presence of Hebrew and Egyptian wordplays, therefore, provide good evidence of ancient authorship and in turn good evidence that its historical content is authentically ancient as well.

 

Ryan, I believe that the Egyptian and Hebrew word plays in the Book of Mormon do present strong evidence that the underlying document was written in some type of Egyptian language by a Hebrew author or authors, which is what the Book of Mormon claims for itself. If that were not found, it would be even easier for critics to dismiss the Book of Mormon out of hand. I believe that research by LDS scholars has shown that some of the name types were 

When I speak about historicity, I (and I am pretty sure that the critics) am/are speaking about evidence that that  a man named Lehi and named family members lived in or about Jerusalem during the first year of the reign of Zedekiah. That peoples named Jaredites, Nephites, Lamanites, etc. actually existed. There are some tantalizing bits of evidence in the Old World, and for some LDS scholars, there are tantalizing bits of evidence in Mesoamerica. But all LDS scholars do not agree with just what the evidence is or what it means.

 

1 hour ago, Rajah Manchou said:

The Smiths lived for several years just a few miles from the center of Hebrew studies in America, Dartmouth. Nearly everybody at Dartmouth learned, and spoke, Hebrew.

Biblical Hebrew in Colonial America: The Case of Dartmouth
Shalom Goldman
American Jewish History
Vol. 79, No. 2 (Winter 1989/1990), pp. 173-180

Dr. John Smith (a cousin of Joseph's grandfather) was a professor at Dartmouth and was New England's leading scholar in the Hebrew language. He wrote one of the first Hebrew Grammars in America. He also mastered Chaldaic, Arabic and Aramaic and other oriental languages. He was the college librarian, and was charged with collecting books on Biblical Hebrew. Both Ethan Smith and Solomon Spaulding were his students, and he had sent Solomon's good friend, Elijah Parish, to his hometown of Byfield to oversee the parish there. Elijah wrote detailed books on Biblical geography. 

There were plenty of people within 10 to 15 miles of the Smiths, even within the Smith family, that could have done what we assume couldn't have been done. Not saying that's what happened, but we need to accept that the Smiths weren't as isolated as we might think.

I live within close proximity to many really good universities and am acquainted with men who speak and write other languages pretty fluently. I actually have a son fluent in mandarin Chinese and teaches it as a second language to students (in Hong Kong.) For some obscure reason, none of that learning has transferred to me. I do not write or speak English at all, and sputter along in an American patois.

What those men learned in Hebrew at the time probably were not aware of was the Hebrew word plays in the Bible the discovery of which I believe is of a more recent origin. Egyptian word would be even more problematic since it is very unlikely that any of those learned men with whom Joseph may have been acquainted with were familiar with Egyptian (Coptic). I could be wrong about that. I believe that research by LDS scholars has shown that some of the Hebrew name types were particular to the time of Lehi als, which would mean that an author would needs be conversant with that fact or be from that era.

Glenn

 

[Calm]

1 hour ago, Glenn101 said:

I do not write or speak English at all, and sputter along in an American patois.

Just start adding a "u" to color and favorite, etc. and you will do fine (I picked up the habit in elementary school somehow, had a grade 8 teacher mark "colour" as a spelling error and refuse to change it even when I showed it to her in a dictionary to justify the use, I was so ticked off at her; autocorrect reminds me of her).

Edited July 7, 2018 by Calm