Posted by:
The Oncoming Storm - bc
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Date: January 14, 2013 12:18AM
Dear DogEatDog’s assholy FIL:
You begin your letter by stating you are close minded and completely unwilling to consider anything other than what you already believe might be true. Shortly thereafter you ask us to be open minded. Surely you can see the hypocrisy in this. You also personally attacked and demeaned both myself and others I hold in high regard. I will not lower myself to that but will simply address the issues you pose.
FIL, you better have read every word of this by the time we talk next.
As you did in your letter, please allow us to state firmly and clearly that we are completely convinced and have come the a firm conclusion that the Mormon church is not true, that the Book of Mormon is not historical, and that Joseph Smith was not a prophet. With that said, unlike you, if we were ever to see and find evidence that we are wrong in our conclusions we would be willing to follow the evidence. That in fact is exactly what has allowed us to get to where we have gotten – reconsidering ones beliefs is very difficult to do, but we were able to do so. Looking for the truth despite our preconceived notions and emotional experiences was a difficult process, but it landed us where we are now.
Now, we will address each of your points one by one:
1) You state that you have a sure knowledge because you have had an emotional feeling that you call the Holy Ghost multiple times.
The problem with this is that finding truth based on feelings is proven to be fallible. The easiest example is that other religions that directly contradict yours report having the same emotions. So who is right and who is wrong? You can’t both be right. And you can’t say they have those feelings because they have a portion of the truth. How do you know that you aren't the one who has a portion of the truth?
Would it not be the pinnacle of arrogance and pride to determine that their spiritual feelings are wrong and that yours is right?
In fact D&C 9 states:
But, behold, I say unto you, that you must study it out in your mind; then you must ask me if it be right, and if it is right I will cause that your bosom shall burn within you; therefore, you shall feel that it is right.
9 But if it be not right you shall have no such feelings, but you shall have a stupor of thought that shall cause you to forget the thing which is wrong.
This is exactly what I did. When I tried to pray and ask if the church is true I always had a stupor of thought. I just can’t see how it adds up. When I did as I am told and studied it out , the more I learned and the more I thought about it the bigger and bigger the stupor of thought became.
Finally I did the unthinkable and I dared to sincerely ask with real intent if the church was false. I prayed about it and I finally had the true “burning in the bosom”. Finally the answer was clear. Finally my heart and mind agreed just like D&C 9 says it should when I have found the truth.
I have done everything the church says I should do and I came to the opposite conclusion you did based on exactly the same criteria. Who is right and who is wrong? Why are your feelings and spiritual experiences more valid than mine? You can’t just say keep praying until you get the right answer defined as the answer you want me to get. I followed the program. The answer I received was the church is false.
Let’s illustrate further:
Try to match these 8 religions to the following 20 quotes (the wording has been altered to avoid obvious cues – things like “after reading the Koran.”
Atheist
Buddhist
Catholic
Hindu
Islam
Mormon
New Age
Protestant
Universal Unitarian
1. “I felt a burning in my heart, and a great burden seemed to have left me.”
2. “But what can I say? How can I describe an experience so profound and so beautiful? Shall I say that it was the most blessed experience of my life? Shall I say that God touched my heart and gave me a feeling of peace I had not known before? Shall I describe the tears that flowed freely from my eyes, affirming my . . . faith, as I . . . begged God's blessings for myself and for those I love?”
3. “The sense I had of divine things, would often of a sudden kindle up, as it were, a sweet burning in my heart; an ardor of soul, that I know not how to express.”1
4. “As I read these books in a . . . bookstore, . . . I felt a burning in my heart that I should come and investigate.”
5. “Even as a child, without understanding much about the complex doctrine . . . he was attracted to church. There he often felt a strong feeling of peace flowing through his body.”
6. “I was praying . . . when I felt a burning shaft of . . . love come through my head and into my heart.”1
7. “I truly wanted to know the truth. After a few weeks, I stumbled onto texts which . . . answered my questions in a way that I had not heard of before. I read everything . . .and I even tried the experiment of asking God for . . . his divine love. After about 6 weeks, I felt a burning in my chest and a sensation that was unlike anything I had ever felt. It was pure happiness and peace. I knew then that God had sent His love to me.”
8. “A feeling of peace and certitude would tell me when I had found the answers and often after people would help me by pointing in the right direction.”
9. “We gave up a lot of things. What did I get in return? I received a feeling of peace, hope and security. I no longer lay awake at night worrying. I stopped cussing. I became much more honest in all aspects of my life. God has changed my heart and my life. My husband’s heart is changing also. We pray all the time and really feel God’s presence in our marriage. My perspective has changed. My view of life has changed about what is truly important.”
10. “Many women described a feeling of euphoria after they committed to following God . . . . One woman described a feeling of peace; she said: ‘It is like you are born again and you can start all over again, free from sin.’”
11. “A feeling of peace seemed to flow into me with a sense of togetherness . . . . . I felt very peaceful from inside and also felt warmth . . . .”
12. “I felt a burning sensation in my heart.”
13. “That inner light, that we all have or had at some time in our existence, was nearly burnt out for me. But in the church . . . I found a feeling of peace, inner solitude and quietness that I’d also found in reading the text and pondering over its meaning and trying to practice what it tells us.”
14. “For the first time I not only felt accountable for my past sins but I had to fight back tears. I knew that I had let down God and my family . . . . However, I also knew I was forgiven! It gave me a feeling of peace that I have never felt it in my whole life. I felt like I had a huge weight lifted off of me and that I was finally home and free . . . . I felt like a new person.”
15. “Every time I am there at the church building, a feeling of peace overcomes me.”
16. “Every time I was with the church members, I felt this warm feeling, a feeling of peace and for the first time in my life since my church-going days, I wanted to follow God . . . .”
17. “About 10 years ago, when Jenny and I decided to start a family, we began looking for a spiritual community for our kids. During my first service at the church. . . I was hooked. I recall the feeling of peace that I felt when I was attending services.”
18. “The power of God came into me then. I had this warm and overwhelming feeling of peace and security. It’s hard to explain. I had to . . . stop myself from falling backward.”
19. “The religious leader looked into my eyes deeply for a moment, and I experienced a feeling of peace and love unlike anything I had ever experienced before.”
20. “After praying, immediately I was flooded with a deep feeling of peace, comfort, and hope.”
21. “I recently spent an afternoon on the northwestern shore of the Sea of Galilee, atop the mount where Jesus is believed to have preached his most famous sermon. . . . As I sat and gazed upon the surrounding hills gently sloping to an inland sea, a feeling of peace came over me. It soon grew to a blissful stillness that silenced my thoughts. In an instant, the sense of being a separate self—an “I” or a “me”—vanished. . . . The experience lasted just a few moments, but returned many times as I gazed out over the land where Jesus is believed to have walked, gathered his apostles, and worked many of his miracles.”
My point here is not to say that any of these people’s experiences are invalid or that they are not valuable, or that religion is bad. Nor am I trying to say that this proves any certain religion to be true or false – just that spiritual experiences are a universal human emotion, and that, just like any emotional experience, they are not enough by themselves to be reliable indicators of absolute truth. This is easy to demonstrate using religious experiences, since the claims of most of these religions are contradictory. Thus, if one of the above religions were true in the absolute sense, many or most of the others would be false. Many or most of the above people’s religious experiences, therefore, could not have been reliable indicators of the truth.
Please take the quiz and send me back the answers and I’ll let you know how accurately you discerned who felt what.
[Answers: 1. Protestant; 2. Islam; 3. Protestant; 4. Catholic; 5. Hindu; 6. Catholic; 7. New Age; 8. Islam; 9. Protestant; 10. Islam; 11. Hindu; 12. Protestant; 13. Islam; 14. Catholic; 15. Buddhist; 16. Mormon; 17. Universal Unitarian; 18. Catholic; 19. Hindu; 20. Protestant; 21. Atheist]
The church has to set up doctrine and regularly teach that a revelation is valid only if it agrees with teach doctrine and the brethren. Furthermore the D&C is full of examples of members claiming revelations and Joseph Smith clarifying that they can only receive revelations that agree with his teachings. There are rules in place that you can only receive revelations for those within your stewardship. Thus this is circular logic – you prove the church is true by these spiritual feelings, but if the feelings are never correct unless they coincide with the church. This shows that these spiritual feelings are not reliable – otherwise the church would not need to teach that if these feelings are ever in conflict with them it is the feeling that is wrong, not the church or it’s leaders.
If the information about the church added up and was likely or even plausible then those feelings would be an indicator. However, to determine that you know something 100% surely just because you have had emotional feelings despite all evidence to the contrary is irrational. Again by Mormon standards, faith is only valid if it is belief in something which is true.
2) Book of Abraham
[quote]
Obviously what the Church has in its possession at this time, is NOT the same papyrus that Joseph "translated" into the Book of Abraham. Joseph was reportedly in possession of several scrolls from which he translated the book; however, the word "translated" may be used very loosely because there was NOT a word for word translation as was the case for the Book of Mormon (which I'll get to later). Consequently, it is more accurate to say that these papyrus (plural) were more like a catalyst from which the Book of Abraham was "given" to Joseph. Just exactly what Joseph did is not known today, but if one accepts Joseph as a true Prophet, it really doesn't matter, now does it?
[/quote]
OK you are combining two points into one. I will address them separately.
Point 1: You say “obviously what the Church has in its possession at this time, is not the same papyrus.”
Please allow me to educate you with the actual evidence.
First, facsimile 1 is in the church’s possession. There is no refuting this. The portions that are not missing are an exact match. The sections are missing are the sections that Egyptologists had previously identified as being an incorrect rendering.
So we know exactly what Joseph Smith used to translate facsimile 1. We know which parts were the original source and we know which parts were drawn in by him or an associate.
We also know that the parts that are drawn in are completely wrong. Before the document was recovered Egyptologists had correctly identified which sections were legitimate and which were improvised and invalid.
Furthermore we know for certain what Facsimile 1 represents in Egyptian mythology and it is not Abraham being sacrificed on an altar. In fact the entire facsimile is translated incorrectly. I can provide the details if desired.
Second, the text of the Book of Abraham references the attached image and the beginning of the text. This removes any doubt that the text attached to this image is the source document for the Book of Abraham. The text attached to this facsimile is the Book of Breathings.
Third, the claim has been made that there might have been more to the scroll that was broken off or missing. However this can be easily refuted:
A) This makes no logical sense. Why would the book of
breathing be first and then the writings of Abraham written thousands of years earlier be contained and attached on the same scroll?
B) The torn off, missing sections on the top of the parchment are repetitive. Using this and the width of the parchment you can mathematically model how tightly the scroll was wound and thus determine the full length of the parchment. The math shows that less than 5 inches are missing. If desired I can provide you with the details.
Fourth, there exists an attempted character by character explanation of the Egyptian alphabet. I will skip the details of how it is proven to be from Joseph Smith's secretary but I can provide them if desired. It is clear that the source of this alphabet is the Book of Breathing attached to Facsimile 1. The translation is completely wrong, but adds further evidence that this is what they were using as the source document.
I have only provided a high level overview of the details and would be happy to provide more information if desired.
Point 2: The word "translated" may not be a word for word translation as was the case for the Book of Mormon (which I'll get to later). Consequently, it is more accurate to say that these papyrus (plural) were more like a catalyst from which the Book of Abraham was "given" to Joseph.
So this point directly conflicts your first point. You can’t have your cake and eat too here. Which way do you want it? Did Joseph Smith use the Book of Breathings as his source or a legitimate Book of Abraham?
Your point here apparently concedes that Joseph Smith in fact used the Book of Breathings as the source document. (So are you admitting that your initial point is merely a red herring?) OK let’s go with that.
1) This does nothing to resolve the issues that the three facsimiles are translated incorrectly. These means that God gave Joseph Smith the wrong translations for all three of these images. Furthermore the narrative of the Book of Abraham is based on a faulty translation of facsimile 1. Oops. Additionally this creates a further problem for the completely incorrect concepts of astronomy in the Book of Abraham - if it was given directly from God there is no excuse for these mistakes.
2) The fact that Joseph Smith said that he was translating the Book of Abraham but was, in fact, not is germane to his claim to be a prophet. This means that he was either deceived or deceiving. It certainly puts a big chink in the credibility of someone being a prophet when they claim a parchment is one thing, but when it is later proven to be nothing of the kind.
3) This begins to establish a mode of operation that Joseph Smith had a pattern of claiming that items where ancient texts when they were not. In fact the Book of Abraham is only one of at least four such cases, others being the Kinderhook Plates, D&C 104 (later admitted to not be a revelation from Enoch), the Greek Psalters, and the Book of Mormon.
You are working your evidence backward. You are starting with the dogma that Joseph Smith must have been a prophet and then attempting to altar the evidence accordingly. However the evidence when looked at objectively and not having already decided the outcome beforehand shows exactly the opposite.
Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 01/14/2013 01:32PM by bc.