There used to be a 28 page version online, but I can't find it now. It was a nice size that could be read in an hour or two by those of us who can barely remember it or by investigators. It is such a badly structured book that I have to get reminded of what happened or I can't follow discussions of it.

Summaries written by Mormons tend to gloss over the ridiculous.

Someone here who knows it well could come up with a book by book summary of contents with the sillier stuff highlighted.

Is there something like this available already?

When Sir Richard Burton (the explorer, not the actor) went on safari to darkest Utah in the 1860s, he read the BoM and described it as having "all the sprightliness of Leviticus."

There's this dude Nephi, the son of a prophet Lehi who has to leave Jerusalem to avoid getting killed. His family wanders around in the desert making a couple of trips back to town - one to get women since they originally forgot about that little detail, and once to kill a guy for his brass plates. Then they wander around in the wilderness some more and finally build a boat and sail to America.

Once they get here, they split into two groups - the Nephites and the Lamanites (named after Nephi's bad brother Laman). The rest of the book is pretty much as follows: the Nephites live righteously and get rich and build big cities. Then they get proud and start sinning and fight a war with the Lamanites and lose. Then they repent and the whole cycle repeats. This happens several times over the course of six centuries.

There is a curious episode interpolated about other people who leave from the tower of Babel and come to America on submarines who also eventually split into two groups, fight a bunch of wars, and eventually have one big battle where everybody gets killed except one dude who gets discovered by some Nephites.

After about 600 years, Jesus comes to America, and everyone lives happily ever after - at least for a couple of generations, and then the Nephites and Lamanites go back to their old ways, and eventually fight a big war where all of the Nephites get killed except for one dude (sound familiar?) named Moroni who wanders around for a while and buries gold plates which Joe Smith eventually finds.

And it came to pass that is the four paragraph version of the BOM.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 10/24/2010 04:06PM by D. P. Gumby.

Wonderful summary.....pretty much says it all, huh?

PS The sometimes righteous Nephites were white and delightsome; the Lamanites weren't.

Good guy, white hat; bad guy, black hat. Now substitute "skin" for "hat".

Would it be ok if I copy/print it?

K

I find this to be an excellent way to get the gist of the book without too much effort:
http://lds.org/ldsorg/v/index.jsp?vgnextoid=e59c5f74db46c010VgnVCM1000004d82620aRCRD&locale=0&sourceId=15e5c106dac20110VgnVCM100000176f620a____

great resource. I especially like the story of the Jaredites and the submarine barges.

http://lds.org/ldsorg/v/index.jsp?hideNav=1&locale=0&sourceId=8d687befabc20110VgnVCM100000176f620a____&vgnextoid=198bf4b13819d110VgnVCM1000003a94610aRCRD

Actually Tyson and Rebeckah are right - Mark Twain's summary is very good. Here is the link...check it out http://www.mtwain.com/Roughing_It/17.html.

Thanks for that link- I had never read that.

Who are these people in the submarines?

I just read the BOM this past winter and I don't remember that part. What I do remember is that after the last Nephite was killed and Moroni buried the plates suddenly I was like 600 years earlier and it was talking about another tribe. Is this the submarine people?

Yeah, the submarine people are the Jaredites. I always wondered exactly what purpose they really served - it always seemed like some kind of extraneous add-on.. I now think they were just a way for Joe Smith to work some more stories that he wanted to tell into the book. Had he thought of the Jaredite vessels earlier, that is probably how Lehi et.al. would have made the voyage. He thought of that story after writing 1 Nephi, so just added another group so he could use the story.

Book of Mormon for Dummies?

No, that would be as redundant as saying

Rio Grande River.

I found this one to be really helpful. It was written by a nonmo who moved to Utah and wanted to know what the heck all her neighbors were talking about, then summarized it for others:

http://www.amazon.com/Having-Visions-Mormon-Susan-Wolverton/dp/0875863086/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1287974344&sr=1-1

Susan Wolverton's afterword in this book is interesting.
"Faith in the absence of evidence is one thing. Faith in the presence of invalidating evidence is another."

Misfit Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Susan Wolverton's afterword in this book is
> interesting.
> "Faith in the absence of evidence is one thing.
> Faith in the presence of invalidating evidence is
> another."

simply awesome.

There's an episode of South Park (that's actually a parody of a video that the church put out) that sums up part of the BoM, mostly just the story of Joseph Smith.

There's always "View of the Hebrews." Same thing.

A thematic summary can be found at skepticsannotatedbible.com

Steve Well, site owner, does a pretty good job highlighting Bible, BOM, and Quran by themes. The discussion board expands on the themes. Kick ass group and I think wunna the mods is an Exmo in here.

Samuel Clemens (Mark Twain, link above) said it was "chloroform in print"..and further stated that it was a miracle in itself if Joe Smith wrote it because Twain couldn't figure out how he stayed awake long enough.

Ron

I still think it could be very useful in deprogramming people who are being asked to read it by missionaries.

A lot of people are mildly curious about the thing but not willing to read it all, because, as pointed out, it's chloroform.

Digital photograph of the title page of the 1830 edition of the Book of Mormon that shows that Joseph Smith was the author and proprietor (he claimed he was the 'translator' of ancient American gold plates): http://www.inephi.com/1.htm

Here's what JS himself wrote in 1842 as a BoM summary:

"In this important and interesting book the history of ancient America is unfolded, from its first settlement by a colony that came from the Tower of Babel at the confusion of languages to the beginning of the fifth century of the Christian era. We are informed by these records that America in ancient times has been inhabited by two distinct races of people. The first were called Jaredites and came directly from the Tower of Babel. The second race came directly from the city of Jerusalem about six hundred years before Christ. They were principally Israelites of the descendants of Joseph. The Jaredites were destroyed about the time that the Israelites came from Jerusalem, who succeeded them in the inheritance of the country. The principal nation of the second race fell in battle towards the close of the fourth century. The remnant are the Indians that now inhabit this country. This book also tells us that our Savior made His appearance upon this continent after His Resurrection; that He planted the gospel here in all its fulness, and richness, and power, and blessing; that they had apostles, prophets, pastors, teachers, and evangelists—the same order, the same priesthood, the same ordinances, gifts, powers, and blessings, as were enjoyed on the eastern continent; that the people were cut off in consequence of their transgressions; that the last of their prophets who existed among them was commanded to write an abridgment of their prophecies, history, etc., and to hide it up in the earth; and that it should come forth and be united with the Bible for the accomplishment of the purposes of God in the last days."

(To read the entire letter written by JS, go to www.lds.org and use the Search function to find "The Wentworth Letter").

So Christ himself shows up in America. The entire population accepts him, and they live the Jesus life for quite a while. All converted by Jesus himself. They all live this way for at least several generations.

Why didn't the Lamanites turn White and Delightsome?

All shit.

And it comes to pass that an incredibly unlikely if not impossible collection of tall tales unfolds told in a stupid and misinformed imitation of KJV language.