Category: Translation
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Satanic Verses and Mormonism
By Jerald and Sandra Tanner Joseph Smith was certainly not the first to claim revelations or to bring forth a new book purporting to be scripture. For instance, the story of the coming forth of the Koran, the sacred scripture of Islam, bears some interesting parallels to Joseph Smith’s account of the origin of the…
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Kinderhook Plates (newsletter update)
By Jerald and Sandra Tanner While we give a detailed report concerning Joseph Smith’s “translation” of the Kinderhook plates in our book Mormonism—Shadow or Reality? new and important information has recently come to light. The Mormon publication Times and Seasons for May 1, 1843, reported that these plates were found in a mound in Kinderhook,…
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Joseph Smith’s “Caractors” Found!
Important Discovery Puts President Kimball On The Spot By Jerald and Sandra Tanner On May 3, 1980, the Church Section of the Mormon newspaper, Deseret News, reported that an amazing discovery had been made: A hand-written sheet of paper with characters supposedly copied directly from the gold plates in 1828, and also bearing other writing…
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Alex Joseph
By Jerald and Sandra Tanner On November 11, 1978, the Salt Lake Tribune, printed a very sensational story relating to Joseph Smith’s Pearl of Great Price: Claiming the “biggest breakthrough since the discovery of the Rosetta Stone,” Utah polygamist Alex Joseph said Friday he has worked out a mathematical formula proving a link between the…
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From a Tea-Chest? (Kinderhook Plates)
The Kinderhook Plates, partially translated by Joseph Smith as containing a history linked to a descendant of Ham, were later revealed through scientific analysis and historical research to be a fraud.
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Mormon Scriptures and the Bible
By Jerald and Sandra Tanner Milton R. Hunter, of the First Council of the Seventy in the Mormon Church, recently was quoted as saying the following: The Prophet Joseph Smith produced for the world three new volumes of holy scriptures, namely the Book of Mormon, the Doctrine and Covenants, and the Pearl of Great Price,…
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Joseph’s “Inspired” Bible
Joseph Smith revised the Bible, claiming that a “great and abominable church” had corrupted the Scriptures with many changes somewhere in history.
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Facsimiles Altered
By Jerald and Sandra Tanner From the very first day that the Metropolitan Museum presented the papyri to the Mormon Church, the Church leaders were willing to admit that the drawing which Joseph Smith used for Facsimile No. 1 in the Book of Abraham was among the manuscripts. They were reluctant to admit, however, that…
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Papyri Undermines Negro Doctrine
By Jerald and Sandra Tanner The Mormon Prophet David O. McKay made this statement in a letter dated November 3, 1947: I know of no scriptural basis for denying the Priesthood to Negroes other than one verse in the Book of Abraham (1:26); however, I believe, as you suggest, that the real reason dates back…
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Nibley Endorses Nelson’s Work
By Jerald and Sandra Tanner In the last Messenger we told that Dee Jay Nelson, a Mormon Egyptologist, was given photographs of the Mormon Papyri by special permission of N. Eldon Tanner (a member of the First Presidency) before they were published in the Improvement Era. Mr. Nelson translated the papyri, but he felt that…