OK the Book of Napoleon is similar to the Book of Mormon. I can see that.

But it is also simiar to the bible, in fact it even claims it is written in the scriptural language.

The Book of Mormon is similar to the bible, and written in King James English, the same scriptural language.

So without even doing any analysis of big data or word prints, I can tell you that two books written by young men in the 1800s in the language of the King James bible are going to be very similar. They will have same memes, same phrases, same structure, etc.


Behold and lo, it came to pass after many days that No Unhallowed Hand did ponder on the matter exceedingly...his mind at times darkened and troubled with stupors of thoughts, but nothwithstanding these darts of the adversary he was steadfast, and did with all his might and strength of mind bring inquiry to the board of fellow exmormons...asking...

What's the big deal? What am I missing?

Well, from one point of view it might appear as if JS used it as a reference or simply an inspiration for the BoM.

On the other hand, the fact that it exists flies in the face of the "No one could have written such a book" statements that we sometimes hear LDS church leaders make.

They make the case that it's inconceivable that anyone could have authored such a book in this day and age, so therefore, it must be of divine origin. It's what's called a false dichotomy/false dilemma.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/False_dilemma

The 1st Book of Napoleon and others similar to it just shows that anyone can write a book like that, and can make it sound "scriptural" after reading enough of the KJV.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 02/11/2014 10:11AM by utahstateagnostics.

Well, it shoots down some of the claims Mormons make about the Book of Mormon. They claim no one can write a book like the Book of Mormon and especially someone uneducated and young like Joseph Smith. Well someone did write a book like the Book of Mormon and its 1st Book of Napoleon and not only that but the author was supposedly 14 years old when he did.

And its possible that Smith was inspired by the writing style and content of this book.

Was it the 1st Book of Napoleon or the other one mentioned in the exmo conference that was used as a textbook in New York schools at the time, i.e., close enough to when J.S. went to school or when his father was involved as a school teacher for it to be a little more than just a coincidence?

I believe you're thinking of "The Late War". There are more similarities between that book and the BoM...similarities that aren't all from the bible.

I agree completely. This strikes me as a breathlessly greeted nothing-to-see-here.

So there were a couple of books written in pseudo-KJV style. How many other books were also written in the same style? Just because somebody came across two other books in that style, besides the BOM, that hardly means that there aren't others.

It could very well be a coincidence that the books are similar in style. Leibniz and Newton both created Calculus at about the same time. They both went to their graves thinking the other had plagiarized their work. It was a huge dispute. It now appears that they independently and simultaneously discovered calculus.

More recently, Rubik's Cube was nearly simultaneously created by a Czech and a Japanese inventor.

Simply because another book written in pseudo-KJV style before the BoM doesn't prove the BoM was based on that other book. That is the "it happened after, therefore it happened because of" fallacy.

This is much ado about not much.
(Edit) I do agree that it shows the BoM is hardly unique, but that is still not much. I can think of a lot of fictional histories more believable than the BoM.



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 02/11/2014 10:28AM by Brother Of Jerry.

Being both a math teacher and a Rubik's Cube aficionado, I loved the references. :)

And, yeah, you're right that the existence of the books hardly proves that JS (or OC, or SR) used them to create the BoM, but it muddies up the waters a bit.

The stronger argument, by far, is that the BoM is not unique in its presentation/style. I think most TBMs would be shocked to discover that writing in pseudo-KVJ form wasn't unheard of back then.

Many of the arguments put forth that "prove" the BOM have to do
with "Hebraisms" and, (to quote the not-a-dodo) "Semetic
complexity."

These faux-scriptural books also exhibit those same "Hebraisms"
and "Semetic complexity."

Thus their value is as a counterexample to Mormon claims.

I think the claim that Joseph Smith must have read them and that
they, thus, directly influenced the BOM, is the wrong tree to
bark up.

Hmmmm, I ended that last sentence with a preposition. Maybe I
should have said, "the wrong tree up which to bark."

That rule is the sort of nonsense up with which I will not put.

Ha ha...the preposition rule is not something with which I always agree.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 02/11/2014 03:59PM by donbagley.

It should be "avoid a superfluous preposition at the end of a
sentence."

Wrong: "Where are you going to?"

Correct: "Where are you going?"

Acceptable: "Where did you come from?"

Excruciatingly correct: "From where did you come?"

(All examples above are from the unpublished, "Baura's Random
Pontifications")

As the kid said when his parent brought the wrong book up to
the bedroom for the bedtime story:

"Why did you bring that book to read to out of for?"

The word analysis that the Johnsons did found phrases of up to four words in both the book of Napoleon and the Book of Mormon that were similar to each other, after filtering out the commonalities from the KJV text. You can read how they did it on their website.

I think it at least goes to show that Joe Smith (or Rigdon, or whoever/whomever?) knew about the other books and said: "Hell, I can do that & maybe make a few bucks...sure beats diggin' wells."

The Book of Mormon is "derivative".

You could argue that all books written are derivative. Authors have to write what they "know". If they are clever and original they might come up with a plot twist or phrase that is uniquely their own. But generally the plots, concepts, phrases and idioms they use are often one's they already have in their head.

Many good authors do research to get ideas or inspiration. Stephen King in his book "On Writing" describes the lengths he goes to for book ideas.

Authors base characters in part on people they know or other characters they have read about.

"Derivative" is often a complaint, if an author lacks originality.

Take "law and order" scripts, sometimes major plot lines are taken from cases you've seen in the news, or are recycled from other television shows.

Not much in the Book of Mormon is truly "original". The characters and narrative parrot ideas and word choices that are derived from Joseph Smith's environment.

You'd think Nephites would have something to say that reflected their world not Joseph Smith's world. The book only has the words that Joseph would have chosen. Joseph doesn't have to rush off to look something up in a dictionary, because he's not going to choose a word that he's never heard.

FAIR puts up the straw man argument that critics say Joseph "copied" "Manuscript Found" by Spaulding. No that's not what critics are saying. They think nearly all the ideas and phrases of the BoM were derived from sources Joseph had access to. Spaulding being one of the sources.

Take the books of Orson Scott Card. They are chock full of Mormon ideas, lots of Portuguese, tropical landscapes, and 19th century U.S. History. I read some of his Ender books and Alvin Maker books before I looked up his biography. I correctly guessed that he served an LDS mission to Brazil and studied or had a degree in U.S History. ( I had a clue because so many of his short stories took place in Utah.)

How many ways did Card draw from his own life in "Lost Boys"? Why do so many of King's books take place in Maine? Why doesn't Jane Austen write pirate adventures? Why didn't Zane Grey write a book like "Anna Karenina"? Writing is limited by the knowledge and experience of the author.

With that in mind, why does Lehi's family look like Joseph Smith's family? Why is Lehi's dream the same as Joseph Sr.'s dream? Why do the arguments with Kohrihor sound like certain religious tracts Joseph read? Why do some of the story lines seemed to be recycled from the bible?

Writing a novel or history in Jacobean English of the KJV was a "thing", a style that was happening in the early 1800's. "The first book of Napoleon" and Spaulding used this style. They didn't invent it, any more than Shakespeare invented Iambic pentameter. Joseph Smith wasn't terribly unique and unusual to choose KJV English for his work, if his intent was to sound "biblical".

People are suggesting this book is one of several source materials that Joseph may have used.



Edited 5 time(s). Last edit at 02/11/2014 01:35PM by crom.

Here's an argument made against "past life" experiences.

The past lives that people lay claim to NEVER supply the required unique perspective that a REAL person from the past would have provided. No one can suddenly speak a foreign language. No one has intimate details of how the past society functioned that were NOT already known to the person. In fact they include erroneous ideas that the person held. They never provide unique knowledge that can be verified.

All these same arguments can be levied against the Book of Mormon.



Edited 3 time(s). Last edit at 02/11/2014 01:30PM by crom.

The mere fact that many of the phrases were almost identical is proof of plagariasm. Standing on its own, this is no big deal, but add it to all of the other inconsistencies create a very clear picture that the church is a hoax.

dodgeawrench Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> The mere fact that many of the phrases were almost
> identical is proof of plagariasm.

I would disagree. I think it's the result of similar style
attempts (KJV-sounding language) at a similar time.

If two books written today use the four-word phrase, "give me a
break," you wouldn't say one copied from the other. But if I'm
watching an episode of MASH and Klinger says "give me a break,"
then I, who was born before the Korean war, recognize it as out
of time." The common catch phrase, "give me a break," really
wasn't used in the 1950s.

Klinger also said, concerning some hoop earring he was wearing
in his attempt to get out of the army, "I'd wear hula hoops if
I thought it would get me out of the army." Hula hoops were
not invented until after the Korean War . . . just like Nephi's
Steel bow, it's out of time.

Things are a product of their time. That similar phrases and
similar ideas were in the air does not mean that if two authors
used them, then one must have stolen from the other. I think
critics of the BOM go a bit too far in such claims. (However
if TBMs do not accept those claims, then we are duty-bound to
point out that the parallels that Nibley, and Gee, etc. pull up
to show connection with the ancient world are similarly lame.

Baura, perhaps you should bare your testimony to me too and see if that convinces me. Using MASH as an example vs. a statistical analysis conducted by valid research is like saying just read and pray about it and go off of how you feel. Have you read the books that were referenced? I did. I also did a search and find on the BoM on the church's website based on all kinds of phrases. This basic search that I did on my own was enormously convincing. Perhaps this comparison of big data doesn't resonate with you, but your MASH comparison certainly didn't resonate with me.

Be convinced of whatever you like.

But if you are trying to convince me, you'll need to do more
than has been done. I'm skeptical of critical claims as well as
of apologist claims.

That's fine. Your perogative. I'm not concerned with what you think or believe, I respect that your perspective is your own. I simply expressed perspective and you attempted to use MASH to convince me otherwise.

"And behold! For it came to pass...blah blah blah." It's pretty f-ing similar.

Haha. Let me understand this thread properly.

Someone think Joseph Smith wrote all of, sorry, translated, the book of Mormon off of the golden plates.

Riiiight

This is not much ado about nothing. Read a few chapters of The Late War, or read one of the pages online about it, like this one: http://wordtreefoundation.github.io/thelatewar/

This is not about verily it came to passes. I'm convinced Joseph Smith read this book. He even seems to have had it open nearby in several instances. It doesn't just explain the Hebraisms. It explains the book entirely. The contrivance of pseudo-biblical writing, the emphasis on wars, the message of God preserving the faithful, even specific battle plans, plot points, and then of course the n-grams themselves which gave this book away as a potential source.

Yes! The key is that the influential books were identified through the use of a complex "big data" algorithm applied to a 100,000+ book dataset.

The algorithms, computer source code and methods are all disclosed here:

http://askreality.com/hidden-in-plain-sight/

If you look at this graph you can see the results of the study.

http://imgur.com/Z0Krjsp

Clearly the most influential (most similar) books are the D&C and the GofGP. (because the authors are the same duh!).

The Late War and 1st Napolean also are statisticaly impossible NOT to have been influential.

I would be a doubter if the influential books were written and published in San Francisco, but to have the independently identified statistically influential books turn out to be DISTRIBUTED TO NEW YORK SCHOOL CHILDREN WHEN SMITH WAS 16, WRITTEN ABOUT WAR, IN SCRIPTURAL STYLE has to be as close to a smoking gun as it is possible to get.