Skousen & Carmack Lecture Take Aways

[Ryan Dahle]

4 minutes ago, JarMan said:

17 minutes ago, Ryan Dahle said:

Definitely apples and oranges

No, it's Books of Mormon and Bibles. Or Books of Mormon and Books of Abraham. Scripture and Scripture. The point is the given explanation for producing scripture turns out to not always be the actual way the scripture was produced.

I'm saying that the evidence for the production of each of these texts is different. We don't have any definitive statements from Joseph or witnesses about how the Book of Abraham was produced. And the Book of Mormon makes it clear it is quoting from the Bible. You are taking something that would certainly be deceptive (Joseph Smith allegedly copying from a manuscript while pretending to dictate from a stone in a hat) and comparing it to other instances where deception can't be assumed. 

BTW I'm not saying that one instance of deception makes everything else a deception. I'm just showing why resorting to an assumption of repeated deception has serious problems. In each case, I believe the deception would be far more difficult than most people assume, based on the historical data at our disposal. That being said, if Joseph's claims to prophetic gifts began with deception, it would be inviting to see the subsequent miracles as being deceptive as well. 

[JarMan]

10 minutes ago, Ryan Dahle said:

Its not just about "a" paper. Its lots of text on lots of paper over a long period of time. Seriously, try to transcribe the entire book of Mormon onto concealable note cards and then see how easy it would be to read them off for hours on end without looking like you are frequently manipulating something in the hat or below the hat with your hand. 

Sounds fairly simple to me. My hands are concealed behind the table so I can do a fair amount of manipulating.

8 minutes ago, clarkgoble said:

He didn't hide the gold plates though. Emma was constantly aware they were there and gives reasonable descriptions of them. Yes she didn't see the plates themselves to be able to determine if there were writing or the like. But she knew they were there. Plus the big difference is that unlike the plates, there was no command to leave Joseph's hat alone. So I don't think that parallel works.

And paper was for the Smiths expensive. Something in these days of ubiquitous cheap paper we forget.

I'm referring to the process with Oliver. The fact that it took so much longer with Emma tells me he likely used a different process with her. And there's no reason to leave the hat alone. It was just there to conceal the fact there was no writing on the stone. Otherwise, why keep the stone in the hat in the first place?

The manuscripts were likely provided to Joseph. He just had to find a way to organize and manipulate them.

13 minutes ago, Ryan Dahle said:

Again, completely apples and oranges. Everyone knew he had the plates concealed and probably knew where they were most of the time. They weren't integral to the supposed sleight of hand deception that would have needed to be carried out day after day. Etc.

They were integral to the fact that he was hiding and transporting manuscripts and possibly other implements. The Lord says don't look in this box where the plates are hidden. This is not sleight of hand. It's what magicians today call illusion. Illusions are always accomplished by concealing what you don't want the audience to see. And Joseph did a lot of concealing. 

[clarkgoble]

2 minutes ago, JarMan said:

The manuscripts were likely provided to Joseph. He just had to find a way to organize and manipulate them

Seems to me that makes it harder if the manuscript is a paper size given to him that he doesn't control. (And who gave him the manuscript and why? - the big missing problem)

[Steve J]

Organize and manipulate them??? If I'm taking this from a purely skeptical/secular point of view... you are sounding crazier and crazier

[JarMan]

18 minutes ago, clarkgoble said:

Seems to me that makes it harder if the manuscript is a paper size given to him that he doesn't control. (And who gave him the manuscript and why? - the big missing problem)

I don't know what you mean. I haven't specified a manuscript size. And it would have been in his control.

As far as who gave him the manuscript and why, let me answer that facetiously. It was God that gave it to him to accomplish God's purpose. This is facetious, not because I necessarily think it is false, but because this is the answer that a traditionalist will always fall back on when they can't explain something. So either you believe God can and does do these types of things, in which case my facetious explanation is perfectly suitable, or you believe things are not done that way. In that case there are still questions that are unanswered. I'm actually okay with either approach.

24 minutes ago, Steve J said:

Organize and manipulate them??? If I'm taking this from a purely skeptical/secular point of view... you are sounding crazier and crazier

What I had in mind is perhaps fastening them end to end so that they form a continuous document that could easily be rolled and unrolled. This seems easier than trying to manipulate loose sheets under the table.

[JarMan]

36 minutes ago, Ryan Dahle said:

I'm saying that the evidence for the production of each of these texts is different. We don't have any definitive statements from Joseph or witnesses about how the Book of Abraham was produced. And the Book of Mormon makes it clear it is quoting from the Bible. You are taking something that would certainly be deceptive (Joseph Smith allegedly copying from a manuscript while pretending to dictate from a stone in a hat) and comparing it to other instances where deception can't be assumed. 

BTW I'm not saying that one instance of deception makes everything else a deception. I'm just showing why resorting to an assumption of repeated deception has serious problems. In each case, I believe the deception would be far more difficult than most people assume, based on the historical data at our disposal. That being said, if Joseph's claims to prophetic gifts began with deception, it would be inviting to see the subsequent miracles as being deceptive as well. 

Joseph was sometimes deceptive for some pretty complex reasons. He practiced polygamy secretly, for example, or took wives without Emma's knowledge. I'm not trying to criticize or defend the practice, I'm just pointing out that he believed at times there were reasons to be deceptive. By offering a way I think he could have produced the Book of Mormon I am not saying the Book of Mormon is not scripture. On the contrary, I accept it as scripture. But I think the backstory is quite a bit more complicated than we would like to believe.

[MiserereNobis]

On 10/5/2018 at 2:26 PM, JarMan said:

What I had in mind is perhaps fastening them end to end so that they form a continuous document that could easily be rolled and unrolled

Like Jack Kerouac's first draft of On The Road! That he wrote in 3 weeks (doesn't that beat the translation time for the Book of Mormon?)

If only Neal Cassady were in the Book of Mormon...

[JarMan]

Skousen's BYU studies paper is available and I was most interested to see the things he couldn't find before the late 1700's. I think one of them, "morrow month", can be crossed off the list.

Only having snippet view makes this result questionable, but here are a few more: 

For whatever reason the yellow hi-light is about a line low.

[champatsch]

The "to-morrow month" language was observed before, and deemed to be usage that wasn't a qualifying match, but the "the morrow moneth" language was not observed before. It isn't in EEBO, just in Google Books. Occasionally, good finds such as this one are in GB but not in EEBO. I will forward this to my colleague.

Notice that this is Scottish English. There are a few things in the Book of Mormon that are strikingly Scottish English in character, most notably "save it were" (77×). This may qualify as another one. "To that" = 'until' is Scottish or Northern. Anger (intransitive) = 'become angry' is Scottish.

[JarMan]

4 hours ago, champatsch said:

The "to-morrow month" language was observed before, and deemed to be usage that wasn't a qualifying match, but the "the morrow moneth" language was not observed before. It isn't in EEBO, just in Google Books. Occasionally, good finds such as this one are in GB but not in EEBO. I will forward this to my colleague.

Notice that this is Scottish English. There are a few things in the Book of Mormon that are strikingly Scottish English in character, most notably "save it were" (77×). This may qualify as another one. "To that" = 'until' is Scottish or Northern. Anger (intransitive) = 'become angry' is Scottish.

In regard to retain meaning "to take back" I have a couple of observations. For one, I'm not convinced "to take back" is ever the best reading. My second observation is regarding the etymology. From the French, re can mean "once again" and tain is from tenir: "to hold." So a possible literal interpretation for retain is "to hold once again." With these observations in mind, let's take a look at some of the questionable uses of retain.

The first example I think is questionable is Alma 61:9:

Quote

And now, in your epistle you have censured me, but it mattereth not; I am not angry, but do rejoice in the greatness of your heart. I, Pahoran, do not seek for power, save only to retain my judgment-seat that I may preserve the rights and the liberty of my people. My soul standeth fast in that liberty in the which God hath made us free.

Later in verse 14:

Quote

Therefore, my beloved brother, Moroni, let us resist evil, and whatsoever evil we cannot resist with our words, yea, such as rebellions and dissensions, let us resist them with our swords, that we may retain our freedom, that we may rejoice in the great privilege of our church, and in the cause of our Redeemer and our God.

In order for retain to mean "take back," the thing being taken back has to have been taken away first. In these verses the things are Pahoran's judgment seat and the people's freedom. These things are certainly in the process of being taken away but there really isn't finality yet. After all, Pahoran is still able to command an army at this point, albeit a limited one, and his followers haven't been totally defeated by the king men. Since they are in the process of losing something it seems like the use of retain means they are in the process of keeping it--not necessarily that they are taking it back. This is one possible reading. Another possible reading is that Pahoran is seeking to hold the judgment seat once again in accordance with the alternate definition I proposed earlier. The more passive verbs keep and hold seem to fit the context of Pahoran's plea better than the active verb take since he is stressing that this endeavor is something he really doesn't want to do; he is on defense, not offense. A purely defensive endeavor fits with keep or hold where an offensive endeavor fits better with take.

Other questionable uses of retain are Helaman 13:31 and Mormon 1:18.

Quote

And behold, the time cometh that he curseth your riches, that they become slippery, that ye cannot hold them; and in the days of your poverty ye cannot retain them.

The meaning of retain is somewhat ambiguous since it's not clear if the narrator believes the people have lost possession of their riches simply by burying them. I think "keep" or "maintain possession" works just fine. So does "hold them once again." Perhaps "take them back" could also work, but it is not my preferred reading.

Quote

And these Gadianton robbers, who were among the Lamanites, did infest the land, insomuch that the inhabitants thereof began to hide up their treasures in the earth; and they became slippery, because the Lord had cursed the land, that they could not hold them, nor retain them again.

I don't think "take them back" works here for retain them because the word again makes it unlikely. They wouldn't be taking back their riches (digging them up) for a second time because there is no indication there was any taking back in the first place. The riches have not been dug up and reburied. My proposed alternate definition "hold them once again" also doesn't work because it would create an awkward redundancy. The word retain seems to simply mean "keep" in this context, though admittedly the presence of again makes this reading less than ideal.

I don't see any other problematic uses of retain in the Book of Mormon. In conclusion, I'm not convinced that "take back" for retain should be on the list.

[champatsch]

There are many verses.

The principal verse to consider is this:

Alma 44:11 Behold, we will end the conflict. Now I cannot retain the words which I have spoken. Therefore as the Lord liveth, ye shall not depart except ye depart with an oath.

There are also a few verses where 'recover, get back' works.

[JarMan]

2 hours ago, champatsch said:

There are many verses.

The principal verse to consider is this:

Alma 44:11 Behold, we will end the conflict. Now I cannot retain the words which I have spoken. Therefore as the Lord liveth, ye shall not depart except ye depart with an oath.

There are also a few verses where 'recover, get back' works.

I see now that the earliest text has several examples I missed by searching through the current text. 

[Rajah Manchou]

13 hours ago, champatsch said:

Notice that this is Scottish English. There are a few things in the Book of Mormon that are strikingly Scottish English in character, most notably "save it were" (77×). This may qualify as another one. "To that" = 'until' is Scottish or Northern. Anger (intransitive) = 'become angry' is Scottish.

It wasn't uncommon for 17th century Irish and Scottish historians to mix history and mythology to strengthen national identity. I'm reminded of Geoffrey Keating's History of Ireland and Hector Boece’s Scottorum Historiae: 

"Keating’s history was written in the context of other national histories that were in circulation in early modern Europe. Hector Boece’s Scottorum Historiae (Paris 1527) was one of the works Keating had in mind when he said that he wished Ireland to have a national history such as other nations have. Boece’s history had as its framework a list of Scottish kings and depicted the Scottish people as loyal Christians never veering from the true faith. Boece’s narratives of war and defence were a mechanism through which national identity was delineated and defined. The king was depicted as a central symbol of that identity. Boece’s work is very closely paralleled by Keating’s choice of the succession of kings of Ireland as the framework around which the Foras Feasa was constructed." (source)

The Smiths may have been aware of their genetic links to the great (Mor) King Niall, and the Book of Mormon was an attempt at doing for America what Keating did for Ireland and Boece did for Scotland, namely establishing a succession of Christian kings in the New World. The Detroit Manuscript that surfaced in 1823 was a Keating text written in a Latin shorthand that some have compared to the Anthon Transcript. Pages of the Detroit Manuscript were sent to Samuel Mitchell in 1823. Just a few years later, Martin Harris would take the Anthon Transcript to Samuel Mitchill. 

Its been mentioned elsewhere that you've found similarities between the Book of Mormon and English chronicles. Have you look at EmodE translations of related Irish and Scottish chronicles?

[JarMan]

@champatsch

Another observation regarding Skousen's list: this time with murmur with (non-participatory with). From this source (1685) we have:

Quote

That whoever may be the Instruments, yet it is God's Prero­gative to make Peace and War. For, he maketh Wars to cease unto the end of the Earth; he breaketh the Bow, and cutteth the Spear in sunder, he burneth the Chariot in the fire. ver. 9. of this Psalm. Wherefore it is our Duty, not to repine and murmur with God's dealings with Men in this case, but to lay our hands upon our mouths, to be still and quiet under his Dispensations.

To me this looks similar to Mosiah 21:6: "the people began to murmur with the king because of their afflictions".

 

[champatsch]

I'll pass this one on as well, although Royal may have considered it and not included it in the NOL write up because it isn't murmuring with God, it is murmuring with God's dealings with men. The with could mean 'about' or something else. Nonetheless, it is of some interest at least, since it shows a tendency to use the preposition with after the verb murmur.

John Goodrick, A sermon preached before the Honble Society of Lincolns-Inne, upon the 26th of July, 1685 being the thanksgiving-day for His Majesty's victory over the rebels, page 3
Wherefore it is our Duty, not to repine and murmur with God’s dealings with Men in this caſe, but to lay our hands upon our mouths, to be ſtill and quiet under his Diſpenſations.

Edited October 8, 2018 by champatsch

[churchistrue]

Great thread. Thanks to Stanford and everyone else for participating. I'm obsessed about BOM origination theories again. Thanks (or no thanks) to the BOM conference up in Logan last weekend and discussions like this one. I think it's truly one of the biggest mysteries of my life.

My best guess:

Joseph had a powerful theophany in his teens where he felt inspired to write the Book of Mormon.

Ideas were swimming in his head from that time and on. He used the seer stone to develop these ideas and produce some initial texts and drafts.

It was communicated to Oliver what he was doing, and Oliver had a similar theophany and also started writing on the text of the Book of Mormon.

When Oliver met Joseph, they both had copious notes and partial drafts that they shared together and then hammered it out together.

Joseph started out allowing Oliver to use most of his stuff, but he didn't like the ending, and he started dominating the writing process midway. This piece is important to me because it explains the "L Voice" concept I've pointed out.  https://wheatandtares.org/2018/02/22/bom-wordprint-analysis-review/ 

The EModE stuff is most likely a combination of purposefully trying to sound like the Bible and/or a product of the oral back woods language being remnant of EModE.

The first hand accounts of him dictating were either to convince others of the supernatural aspect of the production of the book or it was Joseph's final check to determine if they had the book right, before copying out the text to become the manuscript.

Emma and Oliver were in on the "making of the sausage", but they felt part of an inspired process and so they never revealed this process.

The Book of Mormon is inspired scripture.

  

 

[clarkgoble]

3 hours ago, churchistrue said:

The EModE stuff is most likely a combination of purposefully trying to sound like the Bible and/or a product of the oral back woods language being remnant of EModE.

I think Carmack's argument is that when we look at other attempts to purposefully try to sound like the Bible we don't get these EModE effects. The latter, that these persisted in rural regions is possible. Hopefully Carmack or others access the trial transcripts to find out. I've become skeptical we'll find them. 

[Physics Guy]

On 10/17/2018 at 12:18 AM, clarkgoble said:

I think Carmack's argument is that when we look at other attempts to purposefully try to sound like the Bible we don't get these EModE effects.

First of all these other attempts were not hoaxes. They were openly modern texts with just enough Biblical flavor to be amusing. 

Secondly their authors were not uneducated writers composing hastily. They were skilled and careful enough as writers to avoid the egregious archaisms that would make their texts seem badly written.

So it isn't reasonable to assume that these few pseudo-Biblical texts represent what Joseph Smith would have to have produced. If this is Carmack's argument, it's weak.

Quote

That [archaic grammar] persisted in rural regions is possible. Hopefully Carmack or others access the trial transcripts to find out.

If similar archaic grammar shows up in trial transcripts from Smith's time and region then this will demolish the claim that Smith could never have written that archaic grammar. The claim will not actually be supported that much, however, if trial transcripts show no archaic grammar. The possibility will then still remain that the archaic grammar persisted in an old-fashioned formal register, heard from rural orators before appreciative audiences, but not used by witnesses in the intimidating setting of a law court. I bet that still today there are flourishing dialects that don't show up much in trials.

Edited October 18, 2018 by Physics Guy

[clarkgoble]

39 minutes ago, Physics Guy said:

First of all these other attempts were not hoaxes. They were openly modern texts with just enough Biblical flavor to be amusing. 

We definitely need more KJV-like texts tested. I suspect Stanford recognizes this is at best a first step. If I had time I'd make a list of his grammatical structures in the various papers then test a combination of translations with KJV-like language (say The Book of Jasher or 1 Enoch in its 19th century translation) as well as View of the Hebrews and Spaulding Manuscript. As I mentioned there are some mystical and occult texts that I don't believe are in the corpus Stanford has tested against that should be checked. I believe a lot of the platonic texts with a KJV like flavor are already in that corpus though. 

Part of the issue though is that while there were religious texts given by purported revelation - fraud few really aped KJV English that much. So what texts do you think he should check? Or are you just saying it's an untestable hypothesis?

53 minutes ago, Physics Guy said:

If similar archaic grammar shows up in trial transcripts from Smith's time and region then this will demolish the claim that Smith could never have written that archaic grammar. The claim will not actually be supported that much, however, if trial transcripts show no archaic grammar. The possibility will then still remain that the archaic grammar persisted in an old-fashioned formal register, heard from rural orators before appreciative audiences, but not used by witnesses in the intimidating setting of a law court. I bet that still today there are flourishing dialects that don't show up much in trials.

I think that's less likely though. So it won't prove the thesis but it'll certainly give it a lot of strength. It would be nice to have transcripts of preachers from that era though that preserves the grammar rather than corrects it. I wonder if such things are around.

[champatsch]

I'm interested to hear PG's and Clark's view of a few archaic syntactic usages in the Book of Mormon.

First, "more part" usage, not found in pseudo-biblical texts and found twice in the King James Bible. The Book of Mormon has 26 of these, four variants, given here from more likely to less likely for Joseph Smith to have produced:

for the more part (2×) (original instances found in 18c)

the more part of X (21×) (18c examples are reprinted older language; there are late 19c examples by several authors)

the more parts of X (2×) (very uncommon usage; currently known last-dated example is 1708; "the more . . . the more", etc. syntax is distinguishable)

a more part of X (1×) (rare usage: currently attested in 1494, 1530, 1579)

Edited October 18, 2018 by champatsch

[clarkgoble]

I just did a curious Google search and I found several Shakespeare commentaries that had "for the more part." Those were from the late 18th century. Not sure if those were what you were referring to. They were also in writings of Sir Thomas More that likely would have continued to be read in the early 19th century. More interestingly I found them in late 19th century use as well. i.e. Domesday Book and Beyond 

I tried to search for "the more part of" and "the more parts of" but it looks like there is some limit in Google's index that prevents it from properly finding those. My background is actually text search and I co-wrote the Onix index engine but I've no clue how Google indexes these days as they've moved so heavily to neural nets -- I find quite often in searches that I get very different returns depending upon how I set the dates so Google does something pretty weird in their indexes. This suggests in part we have to be pretty careful searching Google Books for 19th century and earlier queries. Often a return of no hits doesn't mean the phrase isn't in their corpus. I typically play around with queries a bit before giving up.

Often in indexes high frequency works with less semantic meaning like "a" or "of" aren't technically in the index. One can sometimes reconstitute them. Even if they are in the index if the query or indexing does morphological manipulation to fake stemming then things can get a bit weird. But since they're so common one often has to do this to maintain reasonable index size and speed - especially in phrase searching. There are tricks for dealing with this (such as just always returning a hit for "of" in ones query logic). Again I'm not quite sure how Google is doing this anymore.

When I simplified the queries somewhat to just "more part of" I had more success. One interesting hit was in a collection of state trials. It was also in various reports from the House of Commons. I found it in quite a few other legal documents or documents related to laws or politics. So I suspect this was more common than it appears.

I'd also confess I'd not read too much into "a more part" as opposed to "the more part." After all cognitively it's easy to switch from "the" to "a" without necessarily intending the logical implications of the shift. Admittedly going the other direction is much more common. (As anyone with an older parent knows when they add "the" to nouns that seems weird to people who use the terms more. Ditto with pluralizing things oddly.

 

Edited October 18, 2018 by clarkgoble

[champatsch]

Yes, the distinction of "a more part" is a little thing, but I haven't found it yet in the modern period, just false positives. Same  with "the more parts". A little thing, but the absolute or independent meaning (where it means 'most' or 'the majority', in contrast with an immediate comparative usage) hasn't turned up in searches of various databases after 1708 – just false positives.

Edited October 18, 2018 by champatsch

[champatsch]

Second, subordinating conjunctions used with that (see Grammatical Variation 2016, 1018ff). For many of these the archaic that has been edited out, but the original usage can be seen in the manuscripts and often in the 1830 first edition.

Here are seven of these to consider, showing how Book of Mormon usage compares with (pseudo)biblical usage.

Common in some pseudo-biblical texts

“after that” (116× in the Book of Mormon; 10× with modal shall/should) (11× in Snowden 1793)

“how that” (8× in the Book of Mormon) (3× in Leacock 1775; 7× in Snowden 1793)

Uncommon in pseudo-biblical texts

 “for that” (1×: aa2121) (1× in Leacock 1775)

“because that” (34×; 2× with a conjoined that: 1n0211, jb0560) (1× in Elias Smith 1811)

Not in the dozen or so pseudo-biblical texts I've checked

“before that” (8×; 2× with modal shall: jb0716, es0108)

Not even in the King James Bible

“since that” (1×: 1n2205)

“to that” = 'until' (1×: 1n1809)

Edited October 18, 2018 by champatsch

[churchistrue]

17 hours ago, champatsch said:

I'm interested to hear PG's and Clark's view of a few archaic syntactic usages in the Book of Mormon.

First, "more part" usage, not found in pseudo-biblical texts and found twice in the King James Bible. The Book of Mormon has 26 of these, four variants, given here from more likely to less likely for Joseph Smith to have produced:

for the more part (2×) (original instances found in 18c)

the more part of X (21×) (18c examples are reprinted older language; there are late 19c examples by several authors)

the more parts of X (2×) (very uncommon usage; currently known last-dated example is 1708; "the more . . . the more", etc. syntax is distinguishable)

a more part of X (1×) (rare usage: currently attested in 1494, 1530, 1579)

Is "more part" related to "fifth part" and "tenth part"? ie is it similar forms of speech that would be used by the same author? 

 

[Physics Guy]

I'm a lay person in this field, but if there were a lull in the stream of questions from experts I would put up my hand to ask just what kind of comparison group the set of "pseudo-Biblical texts" is supposed to be for the Book of Mormon. If Smith did write the Book of Mormon, he was quite a different kind of writer from the other writers, he wrote in quite different circumstances, and his purpose in writing was probably different as well.

If I just think about expressions like "more part" that are sparse in the KJB but more common in the BofM, then I'm afraid that sounds consistent to me with overdone fake archaism: an imitator seizes on a turn of phrase that sounds nicely Biblical and overuses it, like a hammy actor who plays a French character by saying, "Oh la la!" all the time. If there are also a couple of instances where the archaic phrase doesn't even appear in the KJB at all, then I have to think whether these phrases are ones that a 19th century imitator might have produced by overgeneralization.

 

Edited October 19, 2018 by Physics Guy