Take the Book of Mormon Challenge!
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Desire to be a vessel of honor unto the Lord Jesus Christ?
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mondar
Member
kevkelsar, I dont think your analogy of the NT writers quoting the OT is fair or consistent. It is true the NT writers quoted passages of the OT, but they did not quote them as if they were a record that they were composing. The NT writers quoted the OT as a theological authority in support of the argument that they were trying to establish. On the other hand, Joseph Smith plagiarized parts of the book of Isaiah as thought he had the original manuscript. Of course he did not, he copied it from the KJV.kevkelsar said:
You can quibble over toddoms statement that "most" of it was plagiarized, and correct him that only "some" of it was plagiarized, but that is not the real issue.
mondar
Member
RND, you are correct, I dont think Kevkelsar understood your point. He is confusing manuscript evidence with a variety of translation issues.RND said:
Did not God choose Israel to be His people? Wouldn't that be classified as "favoritism"? So, that argument is moot. Furthermore, God did not only speak to Jews - Last I checked, the 2 biggest books in the NT were written by a Hellenist/Gentile (Luke).Russianwolfe said:
toddm said:Did not God choose Israel to be His people? Wouldn't that be classified as "favoritism"? So, that argument is moot. Furthermore, God did not only speak to Jews - Last I checked, the 2 biggest books in the NT were written by a Hellenist/Gentile (Luke).Russianwolfe said:
Go back and read the books of Moses. God continually reminds the Israelites that he is not saving them because of their righteousness but because of the promises God made to Abraham, Isaac, & Jacob. Who said they were the chosen people?
And don't forget the story of the talking donkey? Who was this prophet and why did they have a prophet when Joshua the Prophet was leading the children of Israel? This alone shows that God had prophets amoung other people tha just the Israelites.
Marvin
Joseph Smith was a successful con artist both before and after he invented Mormonism. The fact that most people do not have his skill as a liar does not make his book true.
In addition, no non-Mormon scholar believes that the history recorded in the Book of Mormon is genuine.
In addition, no non-Mormon scholar believes that the history recorded in the Book of Mormon is genuine.
Luke a Hellenists? No, I don't think so.toddm said:Last I checked, the 2 biggest books in the NT were written by a Hellenist/Gentile (Luke).
mondar said:
My analogy is perfect. Have you read the Book of Mormon? The people who wrote it HAD all the writings of the Prophets up to Jeremiah. Therefore, they quoted Isaiah, Moses, and others as theological authority. They even state that had they not brought those writings with them, their entire nation would have perished in unbelief.
Also, Joseph Smith did not just plagiarize the KJV. Again, you are trying to debate something you yourself have not studied and read. There are a few verses quoted from the Old Testament Prophets that are not verbatim from the KJV.
mondar said:
I understand perfectly well his point. The truth is, there are no original manuscripts of the entire Bible. Unless you are going to tell me someone found the ORIGINAL writings of Moses, Isaiah, Abraham, and every other author in the Old and New Testament. What we have are ancient TRANSCRIPTS, copies other people made of the original manuscripts and writings. And, from that, you are trusting that those who made the copies did everything without a single error and without the tiniest bit of personal interpretation and wording.
Yes there are!There's tons in fact!kevkelsar said:
Obviously you don't know what a "manuscript" is. They didn't have copy machines and printing presses way back when so writings were continuously written and re-written.
Which are called "manuscripts"! Manu as in "manual."
There is no doubt there are minor errors in spelling and grammar but your argument is specious at best. Your argument is that, "Yeah, I know there are no manuscripts of the book of Mormon but manuscripts are just full of errors so they are unreliable so it's better NOT to have a manuscript." Wow, that makes very little sense.
Allow me to educate you:
Manuscript: the original text of an author's work, handwritten or now usually typed, that is submitted to a publisher.
Transcript: a written, typewritten, or printed copy; something transcribed or made by transcribing. An exact copy or reproduction, esp. one having an official status.
A manuscript is the ORIGINAL author's writing, meaning if you have the manuscript of all the writings in the Bible, then you have the ORIGINAL writings from when Moses, Isaiah, Abraham, Matthew, Mark, Luke, John, Paul, etc. put their words into writing by their OWN hand. So, you're telling me that the ORIGINAL writings of the Prophets are available today? That we can go to a document and say that it is the Prophet's handwriting?
Now, a transcript is merely someone making copies of a manuscript. Here is where the problems come in. Back then, everything was handwritten. So, you're telling me that as people transcribed the original copies (manuscripts), and others began transcribing the transcriptions, and then other began translating the transcriptions, and other began transcribing the translations of the transcriptions, and still others began translating the transcriptions of translations of transcriptions (are you still with me?) that there was never a single word missed? That there was never a single mistake? There was never a "liberty" taken by the transcriber/translator when a word or phrase wasn't legible, or an exact translation didn't exist from one language to another?
Manuscript: the original text of an author's work, handwritten or now usually typed, that is submitted to a publisher.
Transcript: a written, typewritten, or printed copy; something transcribed or made by transcribing. An exact copy or reproduction, esp. one having an official status.
A manuscript is the ORIGINAL author's writing, meaning if you have the manuscript of all the writings in the Bible, then you have the ORIGINAL writings from when Moses, Isaiah, Abraham, Matthew, Mark, Luke, John, Paul, etc. put their words into writing by their OWN hand. So, you're telling me that the ORIGINAL writings of the Prophets are available today? That we can go to a document and say that it is the Prophet's handwriting?
Now, a transcript is merely someone making copies of a manuscript. Here is where the problems come in. Back then, everything was handwritten. So, you're telling me that as people transcribed the original copies (manuscripts), and others began transcribing the transcriptions, and then other began translating the transcriptions, and other began transcribing the translations of the transcriptions, and still others began translating the transcriptions of translations of transcriptions (are you still with me?) that there was never a single word missed? That there was never a single mistake? There was never a "liberty" taken by the transcriber/translator when a word or phrase wasn't legible, or an exact translation didn't exist from one language to another?
Bible manuscripts come from different sources and some of those sources are less reliable than others. There are no Biblical "transcripts" that were ever written of made. The "manuscripts" that we have from the Antioch are more accurate and reliable than those of Alexandria.kevkelsar said:
No, what I'm telling you is that those manuscripts (still called manuscripts) have been painstakingly reproduced from the originals in the most accurate way humanly possible.
There were certainly some errors in grammar, spelling, and a missing word or two, for sure. They were humans no doubt and mistakes were made. But what you are attempting to do as I said previously is that since there were these minor errors then all manuscripts are compromised in order to justify the fact that there are no original manuscripts of Joseph Smith's writings. That's an odd way to attempt to justify his fantasies.
Sure, but even with that the copies of the original manuscripts are remarkably accurate.
Well, that's why you find so little weight and trust given to the Alexandrian manuscripts because of the doctrine they sought to support is reflected in those manuscripts.
http://www.biblebelievers.com/JEcob1.html
Again, I find it odd that you would argue that all manuscripts cannot be trusted because there are some errors in them when there are no manuscripts available from Joseph Smith's writings. Moreover there have been over 3,900 corrections made to the Book of Mormon which would indicate that we should ignore that book because of all those errors!
http://www.apologeticspress.org/rr/repr ... Mormon.pdf
II Nephi 19:1 -
Nevertheless, the dimness shall not be such as was in her vexation, when at first he lightly afflicted the land of Zebulun, and the land of Naphtali, and afterwards did more grievously afflict by the way of the Red Sea beyond Jordan in Galilee of the nations.
Isaiah 9:1
Nevertheless the dimness [shall] not [be] such as [was] in her vexation, when at the first he lightly afflicted the land of Zebulun and the land of Naphtali, and afterward did more grievously afflict [her by] the way of the sea, beyond Jordan, in Galilee of the nations.
The Book of Mormon qualifies the reference to "way of the sea" in Isaiah, and makes it the Red Sea. This is, however, quite impossible.
During the Kingdom Age (about 1000 BC and onwards), the land of Naphtali bordered the Sea of Galilee to the West. The land of Zabulun bordered Naphtali to the West and South. It is within this region that we find many names from Jesus' ministry - Capernaum, Cana, Genneserat, Bethsaida and, of couse, Galilee. The quotation from Isaiah thus neatly pinpoints the area of the Messiah's future ministry.
The Red Sea, however, is over 250 miles to the South of Galilee, near the Egyptian border. There is no way that Isaiah could at any stage have contained the geographical qualifier "Red".
There is further proof of this assertion. Firstly, the quotation also mentions that "the sea" is beyond Jordan, in Galilee. The Jordan River, of course, empties into the Dead Sea, and never reaches the Red Sea at all. Further, the Red Sea is definitely nowhere near Galilee.
Secondly, this verse from Isaiah was quoted by Matthew in Matthew 4:12-16, specifically with reference to Galilee and Capernaum. The quotation in Matthew is also missing the reference to the Red Sea.
There is thus ample proof that the word "Red" was never a part of Isaiah 9:1. How then, did it get into the Book of Mormon? Could it be that the verse was altered by an imaginative, but woefully geographically challenged New York farmboy, as he was copying parts of Isaiah into the Book of Mormon?
http://www.lds-mormon.com/bom.shtml
Saint Luke was born of Greek origin in the city of Antioch. Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Luke_the_E ... Milligan-1RND said:Luke a Hellenists? No, I don't think so.toddm said:Last I checked, the 2 biggest books in the NT were written by a Hellenist/Gentile (Luke).
Right. I understand that. Doesn't mean he bought into the Hellenistic paganism which was the point I was making.toddm said:Saint Luke was born of Greek origin in the city of Antioch. Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Luke_the_E ... Milligan-1RND said:Luke a Hellenists? No, I don't think so.toddm said:Last I checked, the 2 biggest books in the NT were written by a Hellenist/Gentile (Luke).
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hellenistic_civilization
My main point was that the Bible wasn't only written by Jews.RND said:No sweat! All's good.toddm said:
No sweat! All's good.toddm said:
[/quote]My main point was that the Bible wasn't only written by Jews.[/quote] I gotcha. you're good!
RND makes a two main points in a prior post.
1) Changes in manuscripts discredit the text.
2) Lack of original manuscripts discredit the text.
Regarding the two points that RND makes :
The first claim rnd makes is that changes in manuscripts discredit the manuscript. I think the logic here is incorrect as it applies to ancient texts. For example, if 3,900 changes to the Book of Mormon discredit it, then what does many, many more changes to the various bibles indicate? We see thousands of plus, of minus, and of variation changes made to Old and New Testament manuscripts. If we disregard a text based on the principle that it has “changedâ€, then does one disregard modern Old and New Testaments? (since OT and NT have undergone many more changes than the Book of Mormon or Quran or Pseudoepigraphs, or NT apocrypha or many other sacred historical texts)
My point is simply that the principle that changes in manuscript discredits the manuscript is a principle that cuts both ways and is going to be very discomforting to a Christian who is willing to apply it equally to their own texts. The agnostics who adopt this rule must automatically discard the Old and New Testaments. Historians realize that Old and New Testament manuscripts and various versions of these books cannot survive RND’s rule since the Old and New Testament texts have undergone so many changes themselves.
Papias not only reminds us that the New Testament of HIS day represented only a small portion of the sacred literature in circulation among the Christian Saints, but it is Papia's himself (a non apostle) who Lighfoot attributes our current version of the woman caught in "sin". It's long been known that John's trinity text was a spurious addition that was not in the earliest versions. Because of this, Erasmus left this text out of his New Testament translation (though the King James translators included it in their version - unfortunately). There are many, many other changes between versions that are IMPORTANT. For example, the different versions of the ten commandments between early protestant (Lutheran) bibles and Catholic Bibles. Bibles CONTINUE to change and evolve as we find mistakes in the current text. A good example are the changes made in Samuel prompted by mistakes (mainly minus and variation errors) revealed by Dead Sea Scroll texts discoveries. MANY verses in 1 Samuel have changed in several modern versions of the Old Testament because of these relatively modern discoveries. Another example are the changes in creation accounts during the last 50 years. Such changes are happening at an INCREASED RATE, not lessening.
It doesn't help when one simply overstates a claim as to how correct our old and New Testament Manuscripts are since individuals are becoming more able to research and see for themselves that such claims are incorrect.
The point is that the Old and New Testament texts HAVE thousands of errors that we are working on improving and they will continue to change as our knowledge of what might have been the original text improves. We cannot simply make an arbitrary rule to discredit another book which our Old and New Testament cannot survive.
The second rule rnd suggests is that a lack of original manuscripts discredits a textual history :
RND makes the claim that there are over 800 “verifiable†manuscripts for the Holy Bible. (Actually there are several THOUSAND of them). However, they ALL copies of copies and are NOT originals. We have ZERO original Old or New Testament autographs.
We have no way to know how similar our bibles are to the originals, nor can we prove that our modern bibles are the same as to the originals. Also, our thousands of copies of copies ARE different than one another and read differently. Obviously the differences indicate thousands of deletions, additions, and many, many errors of other types. How does one claim superiority of one manuscript over another? Age of the manuscript alone will not suffice.
Codex Bezae, for example (among the 5 most important New Testament manuscripts) is very ancient, but it is 20% LONGER than other manuscripts with a great deal of material not found in the other manuscripts. Do we automatically assume the others are missing what Besae included? Is Bezae a second edition of the New Testament? Is Bezae simply a “rogue†New Testament manuscript? Is it a “mixture†of all of these possibilities.
RND claimed that
Also, remember that mistakes in manuscripts which are "painstakingly reproduced" are still errors.
Some of these errors are made to very early manuscripts. For example, Clement complained concerning the Carpocratians and the changes they made to Marks Gospel and then distributed as a legitimate manuscript (though it was a corrupted version). If this version was "painstakingly reproduced", it still was a painstaking reproduction of a corruption. Remember also Clement (an apostolic father) pointed out that there were multiple versions of Marks Gospel. This is important, since Mark may be a contributing source for other texts.
We have ZERO original Old or New Testament Manuscripts. Without these autographs, we have no way of proving which of the many different manuscripts are most similar to what the originals might have said.. We do not even have a way of proving authorship of the books of the New Testament. We STILL argue over who wrote Hebrews (since we don’t know who the author was). To the extent that we cannot prove their authorship, we must admit they are somewhat apocryphal.
My point is, that before one makes up a principle by which they will discredit another sacred text, they need to see if their own book can survive the rule they make for others. The Old and New testaments cannot survive these two rules rnd makes for sacred texts.
Clearly
twacviue
1) Changes in manuscripts discredit the text.
2) Lack of original manuscripts discredit the text.
Regarding the two points that RND makes :
The first claim rnd makes is that changes in manuscripts discredit the manuscript. I think the logic here is incorrect as it applies to ancient texts. For example, if 3,900 changes to the Book of Mormon discredit it, then what does many, many more changes to the various bibles indicate? We see thousands of plus, of minus, and of variation changes made to Old and New Testament manuscripts. If we disregard a text based on the principle that it has “changedâ€, then does one disregard modern Old and New Testaments? (since OT and NT have undergone many more changes than the Book of Mormon or Quran or Pseudoepigraphs, or NT apocrypha or many other sacred historical texts)
My point is simply that the principle that changes in manuscript discredits the manuscript is a principle that cuts both ways and is going to be very discomforting to a Christian who is willing to apply it equally to their own texts. The agnostics who adopt this rule must automatically discard the Old and New Testaments. Historians realize that Old and New Testament manuscripts and various versions of these books cannot survive RND’s rule since the Old and New Testament texts have undergone so many changes themselves.
Papias not only reminds us that the New Testament of HIS day represented only a small portion of the sacred literature in circulation among the Christian Saints, but it is Papia's himself (a non apostle) who Lighfoot attributes our current version of the woman caught in "sin". It's long been known that John's trinity text was a spurious addition that was not in the earliest versions. Because of this, Erasmus left this text out of his New Testament translation (though the King James translators included it in their version - unfortunately). There are many, many other changes between versions that are IMPORTANT. For example, the different versions of the ten commandments between early protestant (Lutheran) bibles and Catholic Bibles. Bibles CONTINUE to change and evolve as we find mistakes in the current text. A good example are the changes made in Samuel prompted by mistakes (mainly minus and variation errors) revealed by Dead Sea Scroll texts discoveries. MANY verses in 1 Samuel have changed in several modern versions of the Old Testament because of these relatively modern discoveries. Another example are the changes in creation accounts during the last 50 years. Such changes are happening at an INCREASED RATE, not lessening.
It doesn't help when one simply overstates a claim as to how correct our old and New Testament Manuscripts are since individuals are becoming more able to research and see for themselves that such claims are incorrect.
The point is that the Old and New Testament texts HAVE thousands of errors that we are working on improving and they will continue to change as our knowledge of what might have been the original text improves. We cannot simply make an arbitrary rule to discredit another book which our Old and New Testament cannot survive.
The second rule rnd suggests is that a lack of original manuscripts discredits a textual history :
RND makes the claim that there are over 800 “verifiable†manuscripts for the Holy Bible. (Actually there are several THOUSAND of them). However, they ALL copies of copies and are NOT originals. We have ZERO original Old or New Testament autographs.
We have no way to know how similar our bibles are to the originals, nor can we prove that our modern bibles are the same as to the originals. Also, our thousands of copies of copies ARE different than one another and read differently. Obviously the differences indicate thousands of deletions, additions, and many, many errors of other types. How does one claim superiority of one manuscript over another? Age of the manuscript alone will not suffice.
Codex Bezae, for example (among the 5 most important New Testament manuscripts) is very ancient, but it is 20% LONGER than other manuscripts with a great deal of material not found in the other manuscripts. Do we automatically assume the others are missing what Besae included? Is Bezae a second edition of the New Testament? Is Bezae simply a “rogue†New Testament manuscript? Is it a “mixture†of all of these possibilities.
RND claimed that
While is this true of some manuscripts (which still contain many plus, minus and variation errors....) it is not true of many of them. Again, Bezae is a good example. There are many parts of Bezae where it looks like the scribe has been drinking and the writing goes off in unusual directions.
Also, remember that mistakes in manuscripts which are "painstakingly reproduced" are still errors.
Some of these errors are made to very early manuscripts. For example, Clement complained concerning the Carpocratians and the changes they made to Marks Gospel and then distributed as a legitimate manuscript (though it was a corrupted version). If this version was "painstakingly reproduced", it still was a painstaking reproduction of a corruption. Remember also Clement (an apostolic father) pointed out that there were multiple versions of Marks Gospel. This is important, since Mark may be a contributing source for other texts.
We have ZERO original Old or New Testament Manuscripts. Without these autographs, we have no way of proving which of the many different manuscripts are most similar to what the originals might have said.. We do not even have a way of proving authorship of the books of the New Testament. We STILL argue over who wrote Hebrews (since we don’t know who the author was). To the extent that we cannot prove their authorship, we must admit they are somewhat apocryphal.
My point is, that before one makes up a principle by which they will discredit another sacred text, they need to see if their own book can survive the rule they make for others. The Old and New testaments cannot survive these two rules rnd makes for sacred texts.
Clearly
twacviue
You are trying to argue as if the book of Mormon is inspired text. It is not. Thus there are no verifiable manuscripts (copies of the original) to examine unlike the Holy Scriptures that have left a witness to the accuracy of the Bible.
C
Cookie
Guest
Mormons cannot let the Book of Mormon stand on it's own merits (because there is none). They must tear down the Bible. They cannot tell us what "precious truths" have been removed or where dishonest scribes have changed the teachings.
The Bible as plagerized in the BofM has the same italisized words in the King James version. I'm sure if it was "translated correctly" there would be no italisized words in the BofM.
The Bible as plagerized in the BofM has the same italisized words in the King James version. I'm sure if it was "translated correctly" there would be no italisized words in the BofM.