Who knows why but today I looked up "religious hoaxes". The first heading in a Wiki article is hoaxes in Christianity, the second heading is hoaxes in Mormonism.

Christian hoaxes listed total 16; Mormon hoaxes only 2. Among the Christian hoaxes is the Shroud of Turin. A facsimile of the fake was displayed in a church in my town years ago and Mom and I went along to see it out of curiosity. I could see how you could fool true believers as many of them seem to want to get closer to God through images and articles and this cloth had the blessing of some church leaders. For us it was a curiosity. The JWs, who I was with for a few years, emphasize the OT scripture against bowing down to graven images and that injunction must have made a big impression on me as it has stuck with me through the years. The Shroud isn't "graven" but it's in the same category as "images".

So we saw a rendition of a fake. Interesting. But there were definitely true believers in attendance. It's kind of spooky.


The fakes in Mormonism are listed as the Kinderhook plates and the Salamander letter.

Here's the Wiki write-up:

"Kinderhook plates – engraved metal plates that were allegedly discovered in Kinderhook, Illinois in 1843, but were actually created by three men attempting to test Mormon leader Joseph Smith into "translating" the engravings. One of the men later admitted to the ruse and modern dating confirmed they are 19th-century forgeries."

"Salamander letter – document alleging certain visions of Mormon leader Joseph Smith that were at odds with the Church's views which proved to have been created by Mark Hofmann in the 1980s. Part of a larger trove of fake documents that led to Hofmann being referred to as "unquestionably the most skilled forger this country has ever seen". When threatened with exposure, he used pipe bombs to kill two people in his attempt to keep the forgery a secret and is currently serving life in prison."

Back in the dim mists of this board's existence I recall there were many discussions about Hofmann. I read a book about him. Interesting. I don't know or care much about the plates but I can see how they'd be intriguing for members and ex-members alike.

Kind of difficult to come back from a history of fakes and bad behaviour but so far they seem able to manage it, all of them.



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 10/10/2021 05:02PM by Nightingale.

The first one to add to the list would of course be the Book of Mormon ;-)

Ha. Good one Tom.

Religion is a hoax

It's not a hoax if you believe it.

Is it really you George Costanza ?

Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 10/10/2021 10:38PM by bradley.

LDS temples.

Probably most Catholic relics are fakes.

What you other posters are discussing is individual and/or top-down hoaxes.
Christian Science healings are collective and from the bottom (i.e. the pews) up.

If I were to edit the wiki article, I'd change Salamander Letter to Hofmann Forgeries since he did so many.

The Joseph Smith III letter duped two churches as it ended up in the RLDS collection.

While I now believe that the entire Bible is a hoax, I'm sure that much of the Old Testament--particularly claims about how the earth was formed, the role of humans on it, human sexuality, and early human history, among others--are provably false.

ALL of mormonizm is a hoax, so, Mormonism's individual hoaxes need not be counted as separate hoaxes. Mormons is in apostasy anyway so there's always that.