ByGrace said:
Actually you have addressed nothing.
How typical and predictable. I asked you to present criticism that you would be willing to stand behind, rather than abandon for an additional criticism. I addressed your first criticism where you claimed that Nephi quoted Malachi. I showed that the passage was much more similar to a passage from Isaiah. In reply, you say that I have addressed nothing. Well, if youre content to ignore what I wrote, I guess I can assume that you have no answer. So lets consider your next one:
Why did joe claim to be quoting Moses but instead quote Peter? Do you have an answer???
In your first message, your criticism was worded a little differently. You wrote, The author in 1 nephi says he is quoting Moses and then goes on to quote Peter's paraphrase of what Moses said.
I believe you claimed that you had checked this stuff out and found out the truth? What exactly did you check? The idea that this is a paraphrase of Peter illustrates that youre relying on someone elses pseudo-scholarship or you really havent checked this stuff out.
Peter wasnt paraphrasing anything. He quoted Deuteronomy 18, but his version is different than the Hebrew version that most people use today. Thats because he was using the Septuagint, a Greek version of the Old Testament that quotes Moses rather than God. In the Hebrew manuscripts the passage appears in the first person - God says, I will raise up a prophet from among thy brethren like unto thee. However, the Greek manuscripts quote Moses instead, saying, The Lord your God will raise up a prophet from among thy brethren like unto me... Look at the Book of Mormon passage. Youll see that Nephi was claiming to quote Moses rather than God. Had he then cited the Masoretic version, he wouldnt have been directly quoting Moses. The Septuagint, however, quotes Moses as do Peter and Nephi.
Even so, Nephis quote doesnt follow Peters citation because it leaves out an important phrase from among thy brethren and instead of saying that those who didnt follow the prophet would be destroyed Nephi says they would be cut off from among the people. Interestingly, that is precisely how the translators of the NIV rendered Peters comment 150 years after Joseph Smiths translation. When you investigate the criticism, it becomes clear that theres much more involved than appears on the surface.
Why does the book of mormon use the word "adieu?" This is a french word and was not developed from the greek language for many hundred years after it uses it in the book of mormon.
My first reaction is to say, Youve got to be kidding, but Ive seen this so many times it is apparently only funny to Mormons.
Bygrace, look at the several thousand other words in the Book of Mormon. Theyre in English. The Anglo-Saxon, and Latin derived words werent on the plates either. Thats the point of translation after all - to take something from a foreign language and place it in a format that is understandable in another language. I think that the fact that the word adieu appeared in Websters 1827 dictionary of the English language is beside the point that Im trying to make here. Perhaps I can illustrate it with an example from another translation.
Plato wrote a work called the Phaedrus sometime before 347 B.C. -- long before French existed. From page 81 of the Penguin Classic, translated by Walter Hamilton (1908-1988), I noticed this comment which Plato attributes to Socrates: My view is that, though the rest of the speech was really no more than a
jeu d'esprit, yet in its random utterances two methods of reasoning can be discerned, and that it would be no bad thing if one could get a clear scientific idea of their function.
Does the fact that Hamilton included this French phrase in his translation of an ancient text cause you to question the authenticity of this work of Plato? If it does not, could you explain to me why it does not and the same situation in the Book of Mormon does?
Also, the book of mormon was supposed to not have had any greek in it. It was supposedly written in reformed egyptian which is quite funny also since the Jews absolutely hated the egyptians and would never have used their language.
One of the reasons Jerusalem was destroyed in 589 B.C. was because of their alliance with Egypt against the Babylonians. There are historical examples of Jewish settlements in Egypt (remember thats also where Joseph took the young child Jesus) along with examples of Hebrew scriptures written in many languages, including several Egyptian scripts. How have you concluded that Jews would never have used Egyptian scripts?
Oh, and alma, you dont have to attack and be rude. I am not doing that to you.
I havent attacked you, Ive simply demonstrated that what you have proposed is faulty. I would, though, very much appreciate it if you would be a little more communicative. Anyone with a copy of "Mormonism Shoadow or Reality" can list the complaints found there and in countless other books. I'm here because I think those criticisms aren't valid. I think you should actually discuss them if you're going to post them.
Alma
edited for tone