My BFFs during my teen years were TBM. I remember they were always talking about how they knew the church was true.

Add to that the "it is true" testimonies at the beginning of the BofM: Joseph Smith, 3 Witnesses, and 8 Witnesses.

As I'm reading the BofM I'm noticing how often the writing itself states and emphasizes "this is true".

If you had any doubt, the book itself says it's true. It has to be true!

Good points.

One thing to think about is that due to the lost 116 pages the parts of the book that were written last were the small plates (before Mosiah) and at the end.

By that time Joseph Smith had heard more arguments of why people didn't believe in the Book of Mormon - thus the increase is self-apologetics within the book.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 07/30/2012 04:46PM by bc.

Yep. The book is true because the book itself says it's true. Real simple.

But Remember:

the original stmnt of the 8 was that JS was the AUTHOR of the BoM (written/recorded in 1st Ed. copies).

Q: When & on whose authority was the stmnt CHANGED to JS was the translator?

LDS: We Don't Know (and, Don't bother us with your questions).

Even though the church likes to point out that those witnesses never recanted their testimonies of the Book of Mormon, they DID all leave Joseph Smith and either joined or formed new mormonite churches.

Some interesting David Whitmer stuff

“Burnett reported Harris saying that he had ‘hefted the plates repeatedly in a box with only a tablecloth or handkerchief over them, but he never saw them only as he saw a city through a mountain.’ Nonetheless, Harris said he believed the Book of Mormon to be true. In the revelation given the three witnesses before they viewed the plates they were told, ‘it is by your faith that you shall view them’ and ‘ye shall testify that you have seen them, even as my servant Joseph Smith Jr. has seen them, for it is by my power that he has seen them.’ There is testimony from several independent interviewers, all non-Mormon, that Martin Harris and David Whitmer said they saw the plates with their ‘spiritual eyes’ only. Among others, A. Metcalf and John Gilbert, as well as Reuben P. Harmon and Jesse Townsend, gave testimonies to this effect. This is contradicted, however, by statements like that of David Whitmer in the Saints Herald in 1882, ‘these hands handled the plates, these eyes saw the angel.’ But Z. H. Gurley elicited from Whitmer a not so positive response to the question, ‘did you touch them?’ His answer was, ‘We did not touch nor handle the plates.’” (Dialogue, Vol.7, No.4, pp.83-84).


--------------

It having been represented by one John Murphy, of Polo, Caldwell County, Mo., that I, in a conversation with him last summer, denied my testimony as one of the three witnesses to the BOOK OF MORMON. To the end, therefore, that he may understand me now, if he did not then; and that the world may know the truth, I wish now, standing as it were, in the very sunset of life, and in the fear of God, once for all to make this public statement: That I have never at any time denied that testimony or any part thereof, which has so long since been published with that Book, as one of the three witnesses. Those who know me best, well know that I have always adhered to that testimony. And that no man may be misled or doubt my present views in regard to the same, I do again affirm the truth of all of my statements, as then made and published. He that hath an ear to hear, let him hear; it was no delusion!

--------------------

Whitmer ordered that his testimony to the Book of Mormon be placed on his tombstone.

---------------------
When asked in 1880 for a description of the angel who showed him the plates, Whitmer replied that the angel "had no appearance or shape." Asked by the interviewer how he then could bear testimony that he had seen and heard an angel, Whitmer replied, "Have you never had impressions?" To which the interviewer responded, "Then you had impressions as the Quaker when the spirit moves, or as a good Methodist in giving a happy experience, a feeling?" "Just so," replied Whitmer.

----------------------

If you believe my testimony to the Book of Mormon; if you believe that God spake to us three witnesses by his own voice, then I tell you that in June, 1838, God spake to me again by his own voice from the heavens, and told me to 'separate myself from among the Latter-day Saints

---------------

http://mormonthink.com/witnessesweb.htm