Foretelling in the Book of Mormon

[mfbukowski]

10 minutes ago, Ryan Dahle said:

What I'm saying is that if Tolkien didn't have much of an education or any prior literary experience, and then if he had tried, at 23 years old, to dictate the Lord of the Rings to scribes, in about a three or four month period (it is about 1/3 longer than the BofM) without relying on any notes or manuscripts, and without making any substantive revisions, then I would expect the text to look far less polished and consistent than it is today. As is, the nature of the text matches its known production history and author. Not even close with the Book of Mormon. 

"...IF Tolkien didn't have much of an education"....   ...."I would expect the text to look far less polished..."

Yes I agree that TOLKIEN was no Joseph Smith.  Not even close.

How does your argument that Tolkien was NOT a prophet of God apply to Joseph's ability to receive revelation?

It's ok-we are both ultimately on the "same side", it's just that if I was a critic, I would not accept your argument.

 

[mfbukowski]

25 minutes ago, california boy said:

This is exactly what I was trying to say.  Thanks.

Nice to know we CAN agree!!  👍🏼

[Ryan Dahle]

53 minutes ago, mfbukowski said:

"...IF Tolkien didn't have much of an education"....   ...."I would expect the text to look far less polished..."

Yes I agree that TOLKIEN was no Joseph Smith.  Not even close.

How does your argument that Tolkien was NOT a prophet of God apply to Joseph's ability to receive revelation?

I'm not really interested in debating this further, as this is the second interaction in a row in which you've mischaracterized my position.   

[Bernard Gui]

13 hours ago, Teancum said:

Simple. The BoM is a 19th century creation. Whoever wrote it obviously had knowledge of the topics that were written in the book. They wrote of "prophecies" that they knew had already happened.  

I am not looking at things like Columbus, etc.

[Bernard Gui]

14 hours ago, Teancum said:

Oh sure.  Based on the faith promoting narrative. Lot's of holes in that narrative though.

Asked and answered.

[Bernard Gui]

14 hours ago, Teancum said:

Simple. The BoM is a 19th century creation. Whoever wrote it obviously had knowledge of the topics that were written in the book. They wrote of "prophecies" that they knew had already happened.  

You are not understanding.

[webbles]

4 hours ago, the narrator said:

And as I noted in a comment above, the Book of Mormon very much matches that of a complex paracosm, particularly in the way that it was developed over many years, with "Joseph . . . occasionally giv[ing] us some of the most amusing recitals that could be imagined. He would describe the ancient inhabitants of this continent, their dress, mode of travelling, and the animals upon which they rode; their cities, their buildings, with every particular; their mode of warfare; and also their religious worship." With a broad paracosm in place that spanned centuries and multiple people, Joseph could on the fly incorporate contemporary events (such as Mordecai Noah's plan to bring in Jews to New England to teach Native Americans about their lost Jewish heritage and religion) or personal experiences into the narrative.

Paracosm is an interesting idea but I find it a bit lacking.  Except for the mention from his mother and the story of Zeniff, I don't think there is any other mention of Joseph describing the people of the Book of Mormon outside of the translation/dictation period.  Usually, people who have developed an extremely complex story like to tell it to others.  I have several relatives that have complex stories and they are always telling me the details of it.  Lucy even mentions that Joseph didn't want them to tell any else ("But, before proceeding he charged us not to mention out of the family, what he was about to say to us").

It is hard to believe that he would develop this fantastic world and not mention it to his family until he has also planned out an angelic visitation.  And then he would describe it for 4 years, write it for 1.5 years, and then barely expand on it again.  That doesn't feel like paracosm to me.

[Bernard Gui]

7 hours ago, california boy said:

Isn't this pretty much found in every mystery book and other works of fiction?  I honestly don't see how this is some kind of magical indication that the BoM is what it claims to be when there are literally thousands of authors who do this on a regular basis with no claim of divine intervention.  

Honestly for me, I have kinda an opposite reaction.  When someone prophesies in a book the exact number of years that will pass before Christ will be born, that just doesn't seem to fit any other prophesy.  Maybe am wrong, but can you point to any prophesy in the Bible that has that kind of exact dating for its fulfillment?

No, it’s not like any other book of fiction because Josep was not like any of the authors who wrote them. There is nothing “magical” about this. Why does it have to be like a prophesy in the Bible? 

[SeekingUnderstanding]

7 minutes ago, Bernard Gui said:

You are not understanding.

I think we just fundamentally reject your narrative around the books creation. 

[Bernard Gui]

On 6/23/2024 at 12:58 AM, webbles said:

When the three witnesses were mentioned in the translation, they (Joseph, Oliver) acted on it.  So they were paying attention.  I find it doubtful that they were just writing as fast as possible without also reading and pondering what was happening.  They wouldn't have had a lot of time, but I'd expect they would have remembered the major ideas.

But I was specifically talking about the idea of Joseph being the creator of the Book of Mormon.  By the time 1 Nephi 12 was written, Joseph had already come up with the entire story.  If he had notes, it would include everything that 1 Nephi 12 was going to talk about.  So, if Joseph was the creator, I'd expect 1 Nephi 12 to be pretty accurate.  But I find it more vague.

1 Nephi 12 says that there are 3 generations of righteousness and then the 4th generation fell away.  4 Nephi says there was 100 years of righteousness, then some fell away in the second century, and then everything fell apart in the third century.  So generations and one hundred years can't mean the same thing.  And your Webster dictionary also doesn't help since people were falling away while the 2nd generation (per 4 Nephi) were still alive.  I don't know how Nephi was using generations, but I find it odd that Mormon used centuries in 4 Nephi and Nephi used generations in 1 Nephi.  If Joseph had written it, I'd have expected him to use the same type of counting in both, especially since 4 Nephi was written before 1 Nephi.  It is also odd that 2 Nephi 26 uses 600 years to indicate when Christ comes but then uses generations to indicate how long they are righteous.  If Joseph was creating it, not sure why he would use the vague term "generation" when he already knew exactly how many years had taken for the people to become unrighteous.

Yeah, I didn't mean "copy/paste".

The passages I have illuminated are not major ideas. The rest I have already answered.

[Bernard Gui]

5 hours ago, the narrator said:

For the same reason I am skeptical of Usain Bolt's sprint record. Until others are able to run as fast as him, I must be suspicious of it.

Seriously though, I don't think anybody is claiming that Joseph Smith was just some ordinary dude. Individual people do incredible things all of the time that few others can duplicate. My 13-yr-old autistic daughter is capable of art and storytelling that I am entirely incapable of doing. For a few years now, she and her fellow neurodivergent friends have gotten together daily at lunch to discuss Realm, a PARACOSM that they have created with hundreds of named persons, gods, places, etc. It's full of legends, myths, and histories that they retell and build off of.

Here is an example of a paracosm developed by some 19the century teenage farmboys: 

Interesting thought that Joseph may have been autistic or neurodivergent. IMO for the first two decades o& his life he was just some ordinary dude. Something marvelous happened that made him quite extraordinary.

From the time he was a young boy, our youngest son Talentissimo (now 30) has been creating a monumental paracosm including the histories, languages, governments, mythologies, philosophies, animals, warfare, with illustrations and highly detailed maps of various cultures, etc., in his imaginary world. It began when he was 6 or 7 with stories about Ishboo and Aphid Ball. My wife made stuffed characters of them according to his description. He still has them. Someone discovering this 150 years from now might be astounded by what he has done. 

There are significant differences between the Nelson boys and Joseph.

[the narrator]

3 hours ago, mfbukowski said:

It's just plainly a bad argument and doesn't help your/ our views that Joseph was indeed a prophet.

And Joseph being capable of producing the text of the BofM doesn't preclude him from being a prophet either.

[Bernard Gui]

7 hours ago, the narrator said:

A lot here involves a failure to recognize the non-literary orally-focused culture Joseph grew up in. Childhood education involved little reading and even less writing. Instead, it primarily involved memorization and recitation. While it's a pretty clear fact that Joseph could and did read quite extensively, he like most children at the time would have been taught to read at home with the KJV, where it was common and encouraged to memorize passages, and names of children who had memorized the entire bible were published in local newspapers. It also seems clear that Joseph was less skilled at writing and instead preferred dictating, such that most of Joseph's personal "writings" were actually dictated to someone else to transcribe. This involves very different mental processes and matches not only the production of the Book of Mormon, but the oratory world that Joseph grew up in. Thus, instead of comparing Joseph to other authors, he should instead be compared to and bundled with oral storytellers, and more particularly with revivalist preachers. If Joseph was an earnest religious seeker in his teen years, then he would have likely listened to hundreds of hours of sermoning that were usually presented without notes and involved quoting scripture and incorporating religious themes and languages from populer sermons by persons like John Wesley and Jonathon Edwards. In fact, some of the most popular theological phrases and ideas in the Book of Mormon, such as "plan of salvation," "when they are learned," "think they are wise," "steadfastness in Christ," "natural man is an enemy to God," and "Deny yourselves of all ungodliness" can all be found in published sermons from the 18th century and early 19th century before the BofM. (I am pretty confident that several dozens could also be found. These were just phrases that Tad Callister offered as evidence of the BofM's divine authorship, which took me 5 minutes to find preceding the BofM.)

And as I noted in a comment above, the Book of Mormon very much matches that of a complex paracosm, particularly in the way that it was developed over many years, with "Joseph . . . occasionally giv[ing] us some of the most amusing recitals that could be imagined. He would describe the ancient inhabitants of this continent, their dress, mode of travelling, and the animals upon which they rode; their cities, their buildings, with every particular; their mode of warfare; and also their religious worship." With a broad paracosm in place that spanned centuries and multiple people, Joseph could on the fly incorporate contemporary events (such as Mordecai Noah's plan to bring in Jews to New England to teach Native Americans about their lost Jewish heritage and religion) or personal experiences into the narrative.

So I can understand, are you saying that while dictating the BoM without notes, Joseph recalled and placed several detailed prophecies throughout the BoM of the events accompanying Christ’s visit to America and that this was because of his ability to tell stories….along with all the other details he had to remember to fill the book? He had multiple visits with Moroni before the translation began where he received instruction.
 

Quote

From this time forth, Joseph continued to receive instructions from the Lord, and we continued to get the children together every evening, for the purpose of listening while he gave us a relation of the same. I presume our family presented an aspect as singular as any that ever lived upon the face of the earth, all seated in a circle, father, mother, sons, and daughters, and giving the most profound attention to a boy, eighteen years of age, who had never read the Bible through in his life: he seemed much less inclined to the perusal of books than any of the rest of our children, but far more given to meditation and deep study. We were now confirmed in the opinion that God was about to bring to light something upon which we could stay our minds, or that would give us a more perfect knowledge of the plan of salvation and the redemption of the human family. This caused us greatly to rejoice, the sweetest union and happiness pervaded our house, and tranquillity reigned in our midst. [p.85] During our evening conversations, Joseph would occasionally give us some of the most amusing recitals that could be imagined. He would describe the ancient inhabitants of this continent, their dress, mode of travelling, and the animals upon which they rode; their cities, their buildings, with every particular; their mode of warfare; and also their religious worship. This he would do with as much ease, seemingly, as if he had spent his whole life with them.

When did Joseph have time and means for extensive reading?

In my mission were the San Blas islands near Panama. Their stories and histories are all preserved in songs and chants, some of incredible length. The caciques must memorize them and pass them on to their successors.

I wonder if any of the Revivalist  preachers could match that in their sermons? Are there other examples of Joseph’s phenomenal story-telling abilities after the book was published?

Jeff Lindsay, among others, addressed the Lucy Mack Smith issue here…

https://www.arisefromthedust.com/joseph-amusing-teller-of-tall-tales/

Edited June 25, 2024 by Bernard Gui

[Bernard Gui]

2 hours ago, SeekingUnderstanding said:

I think we just fundamentally reject your narrative around the books creation. 

Well, that is taken for granted. It isn’t my narrative, though.

The Lone Ranger and Tonto found themselves surrounded by hundreds of armed and angry Comanches. “Looks like we are in a lot of trouble, Tonto!” observed the Lone Ranger. “What do you mean by we, Paleface?” asked Tonto. 

[mfbukowski]

2 hours ago, Ryan Dahle said:

I'm not really interested in debating this further, as this is the second interaction in a row in which you've mischaracterized my position.   

Not sure what you are referring to, and I certainly did not mean to do that, if I did.

[The Nehor]

On 6/21/2024 at 2:57 PM, ZealouslyStriving said:

I invite all critics to write a work of equal quality and allow their work to undergo the same withering scrutiny the Book of Mormon has gone through through the last almost 2 centuries.

Hugh Nibley? Wow! They told me you were dead!

[The Nehor]

4 hours ago, Ryan Dahle said:

What I'm saying is that if Tolkien didn't have much of an education or any prior literary experience, and then if he had tried, at 23 years old, to dictate the Lord of the Rings to scribes, in about a three or four month period (it is about 1/3 longer than the BofM) without relying on any notes or manuscripts, and without making any substantive revisions, then I would expect the text to look far less polished and consistent than it is today. As is, the nature of the text matches its known production history and author. Not even close with the Book of Mormon. 

Look, I have read Robert Jordan's 14 volume epic fantasy series, The Wheel of Time, multiple times all the way through, and I have read Brandon Sanderson's Stormlight archive and other cosmere novels and series multiple times through. In other words, I am intimately familiar with very complex texts with elaborate world-building features. So this isn't just a matter of me not understanding what authors are capable of, in the abstract. I think the disconnect is that people don't understand how different it is to try to write something like that without notes or manuscripts and without making revisions, not to mention the lack of education, experience, and other factors. 

I would also just add that I have been studying Book of Mormon complexity very intensely for about half a decade now. So I would like to think that I have some unique insights into the precise nature of its complexity that others might not appreciate. 

The Lord of the Rings, the Wheel of Time, and many other fictional franchises (Star Trek, Star Wars, etc) are MUCH MUCH more complex than the Book of Mormon. The Book of Mormon rarely has more than half a dozen characters of importance on the ‘stage’ at any given point. You can take the Lord of the Rings and sketch out actual military campaigns and see the decision calculus. You can break down Saruman’s campaign against Rohan or the Witch-King’s campaign against Gondor in pretty good detail and see what the decision makers are doing. The Book of Mormon has no map and even in the most covered military campaign against Amalickiah and Ammoron you generally have no idea what the terrain is and what the objectives are and what cities are critical or much of anything. In most of the war they just throw you the names of cities and maybe some casualty figures and call it a day.

I had an elaborate fictional fantasy world as a child and teenager and I could write a consistent chronology of it if I had to even though I haven’t thought much about it in decades. I spent that much time on it. It covers several centuries and ends with a whole galaxy being ripped apart. I was a weirdo. So was Tolkien. C.S. Lewis talks about the imaginary world he and his brother created filled with animal people. Some groups of people create collaborative worlds. Some just create their own. In the past some of these people were the shamans and druids and bards and the like.

Keeping a created story like this straight is not as hard as some people suggest if you have been building it and refining it in your brain for years. I am more impressed by the doctrinal teaching than I am with one person keeping the Book of Mormon’s pretty limited cast of characters and chronology straight. The dangerous part is claiming it is true so it has to interlock with history. The problem is the connection is tenuous.

Even if you accept the accounts that Joseph Smith dictated it all straight out memorizing something the length of the Book of Mormon is not that difficult a task. People have done it. Children have reportedly memorized longer books.

[Ryan Dahle]

8 hours ago, The Nehor said:

The Lord of the Rings, the Wheel of Time, and many other fictional franchises (Star Trek, Star Wars, etc) are MUCH MUCH more complex than the Book of Mormon.

For several reasons, I think it is difficult to compare complexity. But, in my opinion, this just isn't true. I think if you broke it down into complex features per 5,000 words or something like that, the Book of Mormon would hold its own very well. The problem is just that a lot of the Book of Mormon's complexity goes unnoticed by most readers. 

8 hours ago, The Nehor said:

You can take the Lord of the Rings and sketch out actual military campaigns and see the decision calculus. You can break down Saruman’s campaign against Rohan or the Witch-King’s campaign against Gondor in pretty good detail and see what the decision makers are doing. The Book of Mormon has no map and even in the most covered military campaign against Amalickiah and Ammoron you generally have no idea what the terrain is and what the objectives are and what cities are critical or much of anything. In most of the war they just throw you the names of cities and maybe some casualty figures and call it a day.

A number of the Book of Mormon's battles have been analyzed by those with military training, and many of its military details have been viewed as subtly authentic. Depending on the text, there are going to be disparities in this regard, simply because of the level of detail provided. But I certainly wouldn't say that the Book of Mormon's military engagements are unsophisticated. As for the map issue, the Book of Mormon's numerous geographic references are highly consistent, so much so that Sorensen and others were able to create "internal" maps based off of the data. It's internal map is probably more developed than is found in some fictional texts and less developed than in others. But it certainly is a category where the text's internal consistency is readily apparent and meaningful. 

But I could start listing numerous complex features that the Book of Mormon has that many other texts don't have, or which it has in much higher quantities or greater sophistication or development. So, in the overall analysis, I think it would compare very well, no matter what text it is contrasted with. 

8 hours ago, The Nehor said:

Keeping a created story like this straight is not as hard as some people suggest if you have been building it and refining it in your brain for years. 

Um, no. That is just patently not true. Go ask Brandon Sanderson or some other epic fantasy writer how well they would do keeping everything straight without their spreadsheets and notes and maps to help them, especially if they had to integrate all these details while dictating the text in a sustained first draft. It is an entirely different ballgame. Have you ever listened to how these writers create these worlds? It's not just something they keep in their heads, especially when it comes to various layers of minutia (even though almost all of them talk about brainstorming or mentally developing their stories over long periods of time). The complexity creep is way too much for that. 

8 hours ago, The Nehor said:

I am more impressed by the doctrinal teaching than I am with one person keeping the Book of Mormon’s pretty limited cast of characters and chronology straight.

The cast of characters in the Book of Mormon is limited in some ways, but it is hardly negligible. I agree the text is doctrinally sophisticated. As for its chronology, it excels on that front compared to most other texts. 

8 hours ago, The Nehor said:

Even if you accept the accounts that Joseph Smith dictated it all straight out memorizing something the length of the Book of Mormon is not that difficult a task. People have done it. Children have reportedly memorized longer books.

First of all, that simply isn't true. Memorizing something the length of the Book of Mormon would be an enormously difficult task. Many people have memorized the Quran, for example, but according to Google the process typically takes 3-5 years with fairly consistent practice. The Quran is only about 77,000 words, whereas the Book of Mormon is about 270,000 words. Being about 3.5 times longer, it would probably take most people 10-20 years to memorize the Book of Mormon. However, I suspect that the longer the text is, the harder it would be to keep track of the first 77,000 words and the second 77,000 words and so forth over time, meaning that the difficulty may not simply increase proportionally with text length. There is a reason why Joseph Smith memorizing the whole thing isn't a viable option for most people. 

But we also have to consider the fact that when people internalize a text in this manner, whether memorizing lines for a play or something else, they aren't keeping track of most of the data themselves. They are primarily memorizing the sequence of the text, with all the complexity already baked into it. It is an entirely different matter to create multi-layered complexity with tons of content-rich miutia solely in your mind without a base-text to memorize it from, and then to dictate all that complexity for the first time, in a single take without revisions. Not only is the memorization of lengthy texts much more difficult than you aver, but it isn't even remotely the same thing.

Stated differently, it is one thing to memorize the lines in a Shakespeare play. It is an entirely different matter to create the play itself. I'm not saying the Book of Mormon matches the aesthetic quality of Shakespeare's writings, but it far exceeds them in complexity. Frankly, producing robust complexity on the level of the Book of Mormon in the manner that Joseph Smith did (with all the constraints involved) is actually far more impressive to me than if he had manifested Shakespearean-like eloquence.

In summary, those who think this is mostly just a matter of memorization are drastically underestimating the difficulty of the task. 

Edited June 25, 2024 by Ryan Dahle

[ZealouslyStriving]

9 hours ago, The Nehor said:

Hugh Nibley? Wow! They told me you were dead!

The best compliment I could've possibly received- I will be glowing for the next week or two!

I did recently purchase and am reading "Approaching Zion"- so maybe I'm absorbing his unsurpassed genius.

[Teancum]

20 hours ago, Ryan Dahle said:

The point of the evidence isn't about whether or not the author would have conceptually been able to create a fictional fulfillment of a fictional prophecy, on an item-by-item basis. The issue is about the manifold complexity of the text, especially regarding nuanced details and wording that don't play a significant role in the narrative. The more layers and types of complexity that you stack on top of one another other, the less likely it is that Joseph Smith would have been able to fabricate and then dictate such a text, especially under the constraining circumstances reported by multiple witnesses to the translation event. The Book of Mormon's many fulfilled prophecies and editorial promises are part of a larger set of such features. 

What prophecies in the BoM were fulfilled that a 19th century writer would not have known the beginning from the end?  Why did Nephi's prophecies go right up to the founding on the USA and then end, leaving anything after that for John the Revelator.

As for the text, Joseph, or another author, had plenty of time to compose the Book of Mormon. A 19th century author could have written the book and given Joseph a manuscript to work off of. Or Joseph could have created it.  The 60 day time constraint for the dictation being a miraculous is really a false constraint and is easily disputed.  And maybe I am ignorant on the complexity of the text but I spent decades studying the Book of Mormon as a believer and I imagine aside from in depth topical study I have read the book at least 15 times.  I don't find it all that impressive.  The book is really rather boring and not very complex, in my opinion. It copies large amount of text from the Bible.  It spends numerous pages on wars and conflicts that are pretty basis as far as an interesting read goes.  Further, the fact that for most the "translation" he did not even use the plates lends me to believe that somehow, he was reading or narrating a text he has pretty much memorized. 

[Teancum]

13 hours ago, Bernard Gui said:

You are not understanding.

Feel free to clarify.

[Teancum]

13 hours ago, Bernard Gui said:

Asked and answered.

How so?

[Ryan Dahle]

40 minutes ago, Teancum said:

What prophecies in the BoM were fulfilled that a 19th century writer would not have known the beginning from the end?  Why did Nephi's prophecies go right up to the founding on the USA and then end, leaving anything after that for John the Revelator.

I think it has already been explained to you that this isn't the point of the evidence. There are a few of those prophecies, but I'm not interested in debating them, or speculating about why the prophecies stop at John the Revelator (since that really is all just speculation and doesn't really count much for evidence of anything either way).

40 minutes ago, Teancum said:

As for the text, Joseph, or another author, had plenty of time to compose the Book of Mormon. A 19th century author could have written the book and given Joseph a manuscript to work off of. Or Joseph could have created it.  The 60 day time constraint for the dictation being a miraculous is really a false constraint and is easily disputed.  And maybe I am ignorant on the complexity of the text but I spent decades studying the Book of Mormon as a believer and I imagine aside from in depth topical study I have read the book at least 15 times.  I don't find it all that impressive.  The book is really rather boring and not very complex, in my opinion. It copies large amount of text from the Bible.  It spends numerous pages on wars and conflicts that are pretty basis as far as an interesting read goes.  Further, the fact that for most the "translation" he did not even use the plates lends me to believe that somehow, he was reading or narrating a text he has pretty much memorized. 

Any time you want to try to dictate a text that you have worked out in your mind for 60+ days with no notes and no substantive revisions, I would happily be your scribe. Seriously. I think you have no idea how hard a sustained dictation of even a simple text would be under those constraints, much less a text as complex as the Book of Mormon. I doubt your reading of the text (even 15 times over the years) is going to really let you comprehend its complexity. Most members read it over and over again throughout their lives without ever noticing the thousands of consistent or complex details that are continually being uncovered by ongoing research. So it just doesn't mean very much to me when people who haven't engaged the text on that level opine about it.  

Edited June 25, 2024 by Ryan Dahle

[the narrator]

17 hours ago, Ryan Dahle said:

But the types of stories that people are used to telling in their daily lives, or even sermons or talks that they might give in religious settings, are so different from what is going on in the Book of Mormon that that line of reasoning, imo, has little explanatory power. It hardly accounts for the type of sustained, stacked complexity that I see in the text.

Sure, the Book of Mormon is different than most stories that people. Tetsuo: The Iron Man is different than most movies that people make. Doesn't mean it's divinely made though.

Perhaps this is the fault of a certain type of critic who despises Joseph so much that they refuse to see the Book of Mormon as anything but a simplistic piece of fiction that anybody during that time could have produces; that's not me though. I find the complexity and construction of the BofM to be quite a feat--just not one beyond any human capability. I see art, literature, music, film, engineering, technology, and other expressions of creative genius all the time being made by unique amazing human beings capable of creating things that few others could ever do. The uniqueness or awe-someness of their creative endeavors are not evidence that those humans were not involved in their creations.

Quote

If an oral culture readily provided the means for dictating massive, complex texts like the Book of Mormon in short amounts of time, we would probably come across a lot more frontier farmers (or other poorly educated people) who accomplished similar feats. But we just don't. I find it somewhat ironic that the closest examples to the Book of Mormon (which I still think are far from being truly analogous) come from texts that were purportedly produced through supernatural means.

Nobody (or at least I am not) is claiming that an oral culture in itself explains the Book of Mormon. It's just one big piece of a many, including a culture of folk magic and occultism, Indian mounds, common belief in Israelite ancestry of Native Americans, patagonian giants, sermon culture, revivalism, and much, much more, coming together with a creative genius and religious seeker who is likely hyperphantasiac and neurodivergent.

Edited June 25, 2024 by the narrator

[Ryan Dahle]

17 minutes ago, the narrator said:

Perhaps this is the fault of a certain type of critic who despises Joseph so much that they refuse to see the Book of Mormon as anything but a simplistic piece of fiction that anybody during that time could have produces; that's not me though. I find the complexity and construction of the BofM to be quite a feat--just not one beyond any human capability. I see art, literature, music, film, engineering, technology, and other expressions of creative genius all the time being made by unique amazing human beings capable of creating things that few others could ever do. The uniqueness or awe-someness of their creative endeavors are not evidence that those humans were not involved in their creations.

I think it is a matter of specifying and quantifying the uniqueness (which is only possible to a certain degree), and then looking for comparable examples to get at least a ball-park estimate of how likely it is for someone like Joseph Smith to accomplish what he did. I don't think it can be proven, categorically, that his accomplishment was or wasn't strictly impossible. I think what can be said with confidence is that what he accomplished seems exceedingly unlikely. For me, it is just one line of evidence, of many, that moves the needle towards faith in the Restoration. I get that people have other reasons for doubting. It is a big issue. I do find it interesting, however, when people view this as basically meaningless evidence, making all sorts of false analogies or flawed comparisons to dismiss it. 

Edited June 25, 2024 by Ryan Dahle