Criticism of Mormonism/Books/An Insider's View of Mormon Origins/Chapter 5

FAIR Answers—back to home page

Response to claims made in "Chapter 5: Moroni and 'The Golden Pot'"

Claims made in "Chapter 4: Evangelical Protestantism in the Book of Mormon"

A FAIR Analysis of: An Insider's View of Mormon Origins A work by author: Grant Palmer

Claims made in "Chapter 6: Witnesses to the Golden Plates"

What I believe from this is that the European beliefs about spirit guardians of wealth and wisdom influenced the early accounts of how the Book of Mormon came to be.
—An Insider's View of Mormon Origins, p. 173

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138

Claim

• The author claims that the story of "The Golden Pot" involves the copying and translation of ancestral records

Author's source(s)

• Author's speculation

Response

•  The author's claim is false
• The story mentions copying records. The author has extrapolated this to also mean translated, despite the fact that the story itself does not mention "translation."
• Book of Mormon and the Golden Pot
• Use of sources: "Copying" becomes "translation"

139-142

Claim

• Luman Walters likely informed Joseph Smith about story of "The Golden Pot"

Author's source(s)

• Author's speculation

Response

•  The author's claim is false
• This is pure conjecture on the part of the author—there is no evidence to support this assertion.
• Book of Mormon/Authorship theories/Golden Pot

157 - Joseph was told to bring Emma to the hill Cumorah on "the next fall equinox"

The author(s) of An Insider's View of Mormon Origins make(s) the following claim:

It is claimed that Joseph was told to bring Emma to the hill Cumorah on "the next fall equinox."

Author's sources: Joseph Knight Sr.

FAIR's Response

FAIR Answers—back to home page

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1. REDIRECTJoseph Smith and folk magic or the occult

157

Claim

• Joseph's father said that Joseph married Emma in order to ensure success in obtaining the plates.

Author's source(s)

• Lapham

Response

• The Hurlbut affidavits—Henry Harris

163

Claim

• Joseph regarded the autumnal equinox as a special day.

Author's source(s)

• 1838, vv. 29, 48-54, 59
• L. Smith, 133-34

Response

• Joseph Smith/Occultism and magic/Book of Mormon recovered on autumnal equinox

172

Claim

• It is claimed that variants of the Moroni story were told and then standardized after 1830.
• The author claims that Joseph's later narratives talk about a more biblical-type angel and that many of the "magical elements" of the Moroni story began disappearing around 1830.

Author's source(s)

• Author's opinion.

Response

• Moroni's visit/Story variants ^{[needs work]}