Just stared reading Jeremy Runnell's "Debunking Fair's Debunking". Like his Letter to a CES Director, I think overall Jeremy does a pretty good job at concisely articulating the issues. I do however think that he makes too much out of the rock and the hat translation. I see this constantly among those of us who leave the Church.

First, just like I don't believe that Joseph Smith "translated" the Book of Mormon by the gift and power of God, I also don't believe that he did so with his face buried in a hat for countless hours. The hat was most likely part of the parlor trick for the sake of the audience, it was something he would do for the amusement of those he was conning...but let's get real, he wasn't doing that by himself. It's in fact because the hat makes it seem like a cheap parlor trick that I think most of us take issue with the hat anyway, but we generally don't articulate it well. It doesn't logically follow however that because he used a hat to shut out the outside light, that the method could not be divine.

It's not about the hat, it's about the well, and really the whole notion in general. The story we are told as Mormons is that God had prepared these sacred and divine revelatory devices to aid Joseph Smith in translation. These devices were supposed to be delivered by angels, which is why the notion had religious and sacred allure. What we find out though, through historical inquiry is that for at least most of the translation the actual devices that were used were not delivered by angels. No, they were found while digging a well and part of the general local superstition of Joseph Smith's day. The truth about the seer stone strips from the sacred narrative all the divinity and leaves us with nothing but parlor tricks and superstitious antics.

My point is that if we accepted the "official" narrative about the Urim and Thummim, except that sometimes Joseph Smith placed the divine and sacred instrument into a hat...would that somehow make the religious narrative less plausible? For me it wouldn't change anything. Conversely, finding out that the rock was just some regular old rock dug up out of a well and was subsequently used for actual bona fide frontier folk magic and con artistry - digging for lost treasure, speaking to spirits, etc - is the thing that makes the true translation method significant. It's that we learn that the actual history bears out a far less inspiring narrative than the divinity we are sold. The "hat" sort of fails in my opinion of conveying this properly and is way of losing the forest through the trees.

For me the whole idea of translating the BoM without ever actually using it is a problem. The church makes a big deal over how carefully it was preserved for the latter days. Then it is translated without ever being used or even touched. To top the whole thing off, after all that time being preserved on the earth safely it is just carried off by an angel without anyone being allowed to see it ever again as proof! With all the different magical ways of translating and preserving the BoM why did it have to sit in the ground and get carted around by Joe Smith? It's the blamed inconsistency that boggles the mind. First it is used as proof and then it is required that we not actually see and touch it because we need faith. Which is it? If everything must be taken by faith there was no reason to ever even write the thing let along doing it on gold plates, buring it, digging it up, translating it, and having it fly away in the arms of an angel.

It's all too confusing and inconsistent. Mormonism just makes up magic when reality doesn't make sense. If there was ever a religion with one foot in and one foot out it is Mormonism.

It's not about...
The hat.
The rock.
The U&T
The outside light.
The well.
The lost treasures.
The spirits.
The parlor tricks.
The showmanship.
The magic.

It's about the LIES.

I learned about the hat and the rock trick several years after I converted. I questioned leaders about it and it was denied repeatedly. I've talked to TBMs about it and I've been accused of being a liar and a tool for satan. And then what happens? They admit it publicly. They didn't say it was deep doctrine, or meat, or something they didn't understand, they LIED. It's as simple as that.

yes, its about the lies.

They replace all of the chapel, office, temple, classroom, and home painting of JS translating WITHOUT the rock and the hat with paintings of JS WITH the hat and the rock, they're still lying regardless of what some obscure essay says online.

"...I do however think that he makes too much out of the rock and the hat translation...."
*I totally disagree with this assessment, Erick. I personally believe TSCC
has hidden this historical fact from its members because it is, in fact,
so devastating to the credibility of their entire narrative.
I believe, when people learn about this "hat translation" they then KNOW at a deep, visceral level
that something is terribly wrong here. For me personally, if I'm going to believe in a "hat translation"
I'm probably gullible enough to believe in Pegasus (the flying horse) and all of Greek mythology.

"It's in fact because the hat makes it seem like a cheap parlor trick
that I think most of us take issue with the hat anyway,
but we generally don't articulate it well."
*Erick, what exactly needs to be articulated better
than just the actual historical fact itself? I think it speaks for itself.

"It doesn't logically follow however that because he used a hat
to shut out the outside light, that the method could not be divine."
*Perhaps, but I feel that only the most gullible could accept this method as divine,
at least in my opinion.

I'm a fifty-something BIC, and every art rendering seen my entire life depicting the translation is what you'd expect: JS poring over a stack of gold plates, scholastically, mightily struggling to bring forth the word of dog. Most of them had no Uma Thurman or even a scribe; just ol' horney joe in the candle light with the plates on one side, paper on the other, pen in hand.

If someone credible had told me he really dropped a rock in a hat and talked into it, plates not even near him and covered, I would have stayed in the church a lot less longer, I think.

Me too.

Me too.

Exactly.

Same here. The story I heard all my life at least involved reading of actual golden plates. The real story is simply unbelievable, especially since the plates werent even part of the process.

...but learning that he used the same rock-in-a-hat business to scam local rubes just 1.5 years before he claimed to have received the golden plates definitely would have sent me towards the door.

Icing on the cake. When I learned of the treasure hunting I was like, oh, yep.

I realized this and read Quinn's book on magic and Mormonism.

For my Mormonism started from a magic rock. One is probably just as well served in taking Harry Potter or The Lord of The Rings or Star Wars/Trek to heart in forming a religious belief system.

May the Force be with you, Pagag.

My question then for those who disagree, is what does the hat do for the narrative that makes it less plausible than the divine translation narrative?

It was the exact same method he used to defraud people out of money by searching for buried treasure. That was a problem for me.

If the rock in the hat story was working, they wouldn't have changed it.

You don't see a difference between the image of, say, a scholar poring over a Mayan codex, struggling to translate it and a guy talking into a hat at a rock? I'm done here.

A customer of mine was a Mormon and when I told her about JS and rock in the hat she was shocked. She didn't believe me.

I told her to search the internet. Haven't seen her in a while but I will ask her about it when I see her again.

I find it interesting that a hat was even required. The power of god couldn't overcome the ambient light? I would have thought that a hat would have been needed just to keep the glowing rock from keeping everyone up at night ala brother of Jared's glowing rocks. "Jo, you forgot to cover the peep stone again and I can't sleep!"

Kolob is so far away that its light barely reaches the rock...

I find it interesting that translating was even required. Why wouldn't god just give him a copy of the translated book?

In this modern information age, which makes the best "sound bite"? The hat or the narrative?

The hat pretty much will get an immediate reaction; the narrative takes a considerable amount of time to explain.

So, I'd say the hat trumps the narrative. Of course, the hat no doubts stirs the interest of some people, who then will want the narrative.

"Milk before meat" as they say.

Agreed. If someone only occasionally talks to god through a rock in his hat, there's nothing that would indicate that the person is a complete fraud. Now, if you looked in the hat and the rock was not there, that would raise some eyebrows.

Erick Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> My point is that if we accepted the "official"
> narrative about the Urim and Thummim, except that
> sometimes Joseph Smith placed the divine and
> sacred instrument into a hat...would that somehow
> make the religious narrative less plausible?

I believe it is less plausible if you actually find out what people at the time said about it. If your point is the medium isn't the message I get that. Smith could have "sometimes" gone skinny dipping in a pound close to where he had hidden The Golden Plates and by "seering" into the water with his ass high in the air "see" the words he needed to tell Oliver/Emma/Martin when he came up for air. As long as there was a plausible nice neat and clean explanation alongside the bizarre one, no need to destroy the message because of the medium right?

http://user.xmission.com/~research/early/court1830.htm
"Cross questions-says, he has not known the prisoner to look in the glass within the space of two years last past.
Josiah Stowel, being by me sworn, saith, he has been acquainted with Smith, the prisoner, for quite a number of years; that he did pretend to tell, by looking in a stone, or glass, where money and goods and mines were in a manner peculiar to himself; the prisoner had followed digging for money; pretended to find mines, hid treasures, and lost goods, and frequently others would be digging with him; says that about three years since, prisoner was put under arrest by an officer at Bainbridge in Chenango county, for breaking the peace, and that he escaped from the officer and went to Palmyra; and that about two years since, witness was at Palmyra, and saw prisoner; that prisoner told witness, that the Lord had told prisoner that a golden Bible was in a certain hill; that Smith, the prisoner, went in the night, and brought the Bible, (as Smith said;) witness saw a corner of it; it resembled a stone of a greenish caste; should judge it to have been about one foot square and six inches thick; he would not let it be seen by any one; the Lord had commanded him not; it was unknown to Smith, that witness saw a corner of the Bible, so called by Smith; told the witness the leaves were of gold; there were written characters on the leaves; prisoner was commanded to translate the same by the Lord; and from the Bible got from the hill, as aforesaid, the prisoner said he translated the book of Mormon; prisoner put a certain stone into his hat, put his face into the crown, then drew the brim of the hat around his head to prevent light-he could then see, as prisoner said, and translate the same, the Bible, got from the hill in Palmyra, at the same time under a lock and in a chest; and the prisoner, when looking for money, salt springs, hid treasures, &c., looked in the same manner; did not know that prisoner could find money lost, &c.; and that prisoner told witness after he was arrested in Bainbridge, he would not look for money, &c. any more; told witness he could see into the earth forty or fifty feet," "

I kind of agree with the OP. The big thing here is that the church has been mis-leading its members. The hat itself isn't such a big deal to me at least.

99 percent of my old testimony was based on Book of Mormon stories that my teacher told to me, all about the Lamanites in Ancient History.

Finding out there was a special rock found in digging a well no where near that Ancient History would have been compelling to me even as a child to question what kind of crazy those adults were feeding me.

I disagree with OP. The rock in the hat is not a red herring. It's a deal killer for anyone who doesn't have rocks in his hat.

I think that the rock in the hat simply leads people to a third possibility. If I tell you that I bought my new car at a dealership you would assume that I am telling the truth. If I tell you that I bought my new car at a dealership and then later I tell you that I bought my new car from a private party, you not only wonder which is true, but you are likely to wonder if either is true. Where the heck did I buy my new car? Maybe I stole it.

Seer Stones=Bad JuJu

Just ask Bruce R. McConkie:

Peep Stones

(Peep Stones )

See DEVIL, REVELATION, URIM AND THUMMIM.

In imitation of the true order of heaven whereby seers receive revelations from God through a Urim
and Thummim, the devil gives his own revelations to some of his followers through peep stones or crystal
balls. An instance of this copying of the true order occurred in the early days of this dispensation. Hiram
Page had such a stone and was professing to have revelations for the upbuilding of Zion and the governing
of the Church. Oliver Cowdery and some others were wrongly influenced thereby in consequence of
which Oliver was commanded by revelation: "Thou shalt take thy brother, Hiram Page, between him and
thee alone, and tell him that those things which he hath written from that stone are not of me, and that
Satan deceiveth him." (D. & C. 28:11.)

p. 401 Mormon Doctrine

Does it for me.