Not to stereotype, but young male americans in suits are a fairly temtping targets for thieves.
What was the issue with that Stake president's talk?
I saw that a couple of people said they would have walked out.
“The Book of Mormon teaches that “all are alike unto God,” including “black and white, bond and free, male and female” (2 Nephi 26:33). Throughout the history of the Church, people of every race and ethnicity in many countries have been baptized and have lived as faithful members of the Church. During Joseph Smith’s lifetime, a few black male members of the Church were ordained to the priesthood. Early in its history, Church leaders stopped conferring the priesthood on black males of African descent. Church records offer no clear insights into the origins of this practice. Church leaders believed that a revelation from God was needed to alter this practice and prayerfully sought guidance. The revelation came to Church President Spencer W. Kimball and was affirmed to other Church leaders in the Salt Lake Temple on June 1, 1978. The revelation removed all restrictions with regard to race that once applied to the priesthood.”
Major Changes
41 - References to strange notions or false spirits creeping into the church are removed. Instead, the revelation was morphed into instructions on where to live.
47 - John Whitmer no longer seeks an appointment in the church, prior connections revealed, Joseph had to coerce him with revelation. (see 69 where he's called as official historian and recorder).
56 Thayre villainized for postponing mission. (General theme about not postponing missions are being introduced).
58 Connections of current Native Americans to Lamanites removed. Instead, now speaks generally about Lamanites.
66 McLellin is now given a "secret request" tag, and Joseph's first-person account is removed. Important as this is the chapter that gives the age of the earth at 7000 years.
78, 82, 92, 104 - Completely rewritten. References church business, mercantile, publishing endeavors, and goal of generating funds. All references to 'code names' have been redacted. Specifically states that Joseph ordered the replacement of the phrase "storehouse for the poor" with "mercantile and publishing establishments". "Order" became "Firm". - This appears to be a theme in many headers. There's a shift towards deifying the corporate world.
85 - Caveats the revelation to state that those who didn't receive inheritances from the church were those who didn't give their properties to the church first. (Modern day tithing implications)
87 - Changes the revelation from a reflection of Joseph on African Slavery to an admitting that this was a very visible problem in South Carolina. (This is a good one, implicitly admitting the civil war "prophecy" was more observation of current events rather than a 20 year predictor of those same events).
89 - Statement that the "Inspired introduction" to the word of wisdom was written by Joseph himself was dropped. This is the portion that says it's not a commandment. The D&C verses still remain.
132 - Plurality of wives changed to principal of plural marriage, softening stance on whether this was known to Joseph in 1831. (See OD 1 for more changes)
137 - Removing references to the endowment ordinances having been revealed to preparation for the dedication of the temple. This is key when you remember that the endowments were done outside of the temple, and that they have been subsequently changed many times over the years.
Official Declaration 1 - Additional header Monogomy is now called God's standard for marriage. Claims 1890 ended Plural marriage in the church (a lie), and the manifest was considered authoritative and binding in 1890 (also a lie). Admits to practicing plural marriage in the 1840's (interesting implication on Fanny Alger). It removes the claim later on that the vote to sustain the motion was unanimous - and now states that it was binding.
Official Declaration 2 - Additional Header Claims BoM now teaches that all men are like god (true, but it wasn't always the case), claims baptisims were always allowed for all races (also true, but slaves had to have permission of masters). It Admits that blacks were allowed priesthood ordination originally, and that that stopped some time for some reason - claims to be unkonwn when (a lie or at best half-truth). Kimball asked for it back and it was given. Shame Brigham didn't ask before he stopped it.
PGP Introduction - Says Joseph translated & Produced, rather than just produced. BOA now called an inspired translation that began after procuring documents. Removes Joseph as the sole person to touch the documents, implying scribes may have altered them the following year.
Other interesting patterns and changes:
Changing Dates: 10 (1828 -> 1829), 19 (1830 -> 1829), 20 (1830 -> 1829, with special implication that the latter half of the priesthood was reveled before the church was formed), 49 (Mar - May), 74 (1832 -> 1830), 88 (1832-> 1833), 94 (May -> Aug), 107 (1835 -> 1831).
Revelations were split up: This implies natural breaks rather than one mass communication: 23 (5), 24 (everyone their own), 42 (2), 72 (3), 75 (2), 88 (several).
Watering down origin stories: "Joseph's history" added as a buffer between God and the D&C, or stating Joseph directed changes rather than made them himself. See 2, 11, 33, 35, 36, 40, 45, 49, 50, 60, 63, 67, 70, 76, 77, 102, 110, 133, PGP intro.
Priesthood namesakes were removed: Aaronic is generally left out, and Melchizedek became higher priesthood. 13, 18.
Current leadership position strengthened: 18 (new reference to the 12), 54 (Newell Knight is no longer "president of the branch", but "leader of the members"), 107 (12 were now setup with power in 1831 despite not leaving on a mission until 1835), 121-123 (attempt to connect leadership to older apostles, use of term epistle rather than letter).
Corrected/additional information: 39 (Covill replaced with Covel, Baptist with Methodist), 67 (10,000 Books of Commandments were attempted, only 3000 were printed due to "unforseen difficulties"), 95 (houses -> house), 101 (updated county names).
Other minor changes
18 - Removed all references to requested revelation. See also 56. Note that 68 allows it for personal revelation, to specific members. I wonder if this is an attempt to remove the two-way communication of a prophet. Potentially attempting to explain why Monson or others aren't receiving revelations, or aren't asking for them.
49 - Removed the higher language surrounding shaker belief.
55 Section 56 disconnected from 55, the branch was demoted to members, president to leaders). See also 58 when they're turned back into a branch, having previously received baptism, and now obedient.
59 Turned into keeping the sabbath day early with a death notice. This seems to downplay the holy land of Zion and special-ness of it's people.
70 - D&C/Book of Commandments reworded to emphasize later revelations as being of great worth. Book called a treasure.
71 - Newspaper articles of Ezra changed to "letters". Downplaying their impact.
98 - Comments of saints seeking natural revenge were removed. Softened LDS liability to say settlement and fear of losing political / economic power was what instigated local mobs. Now specifically calls out the tar and feathering.
99 - Removal of contradictory information with other versions of the D&C. Replaced with a bio of John Murdock leaving his family to go on a mission.
134 - "Church leadership" changed to "many saints" gathering for the ratification of the Book of Commandments.
Hrmm...except it doesn't teach that all people are equal. I mean god smites people with a curse of dark skin. Not terribly hard to see why people of color would take their race being inflicted as a curse as racist. Sure people point to "lamanites ended up being more righteous than most nephites and all that." But what they miss out is that this was mainly a vehicle to say "Wow look at how bad the nephites got!" and also as one commentator put it, it's like overcoming their race. Like the lamanites were bad but so long as they became "whiteified" they were cool.
And yeah it's no apology. It's more like a shoulder shrug. But I guess it's the best that can be expected from the church. I know I should think it's a step in the right direction but part of me feels like it'll be the last step. "Look we put out an official delcaration. What else do you want?"
Hrmm...except it doesn't teach that all people are equal. I mean god smites people with a curse of dark skin. Not terribly hard to see why people of color would take their race being inflicted as a curse as racist. Sure people point to "lamanites ended up being more righteous than most nephites and all that." But what they miss out is that this was mainly a vehicle to say "Wow look at how bad the nephites got!" and also as one commentator put it, it's like overcoming their race. Like the lamanites were bad but so long as they became "whiteified" they were cool.
And yeah it's no apology. It's more like a shoulder shrug. But I guess it's the best that can be expected from the church. I know I should think it's a step in the right direction but part of me feels like it'll be the last step. "Look we put out an official delcaration. What else do you want?"
Found this write up of some of the changes. Interesting:
The biggest one outside of Official Declaration 2 is the changing the intro to the Pearl of Great price from being "a translation" to "an inspired translation". I wonder if that's the church's stance now. "Yes, the papyrus didn't translate into what Joseph Smith tranlsated. But this was an inspired tranlsation meaning God told him what to write instead of what it really said."
That's an...interesting tact.
I've never really seen it that way, but maybe it is due to the time in which I was raised. The curse comes down at much the same time that Lehi leaves his blessing with the children of Laman and Lemuel, which is considerably better than what the children of Nephi got. I don't have anything in the way of a great explanation for what was going on with the whole mark thing the Lord was doing, but if I had great explanations there would be no trials to this whole Mormon thing.
But I sincerely don't agree with the notion that it was all racist, as so many who are eager to decry the Book of Mormon and stamp the whole of Mormonism's history with the mark of racism. For one, we see that the only time there ever was true piece among the children of Lehi, it was because they had stopped squabbling over who was what. It does not say that people stopped to have darker or lighter skin (darker or lighter than what who can say, given it had been ages since anyone in those stories had seen anyone who wasn't ethnically related.) as it does in the much touted passage where the Lamanites somehow get white. All it does say is that there ceased to be -Ites among them.
I bring this up mostly because within the Church there is sometimes the repulsive belief that black people's spirits are white, or that anyone who isn't white becomes so in the Resurrection. I haven't ever seen a shred of evidence to support this, and I don't much care to. But also so as to avoid the unfortunate implication that ignorance of race is correct. On such an issue I don't believe the Book of Mormon comments.
But people do go about muddying up the issue of race in the Book of Mormon. Were the Lamanites and Nephites physically distinct? Originally, we must assume so. That's what the text says. But by the Book of Alma the issue is more complex than that. You have Lamanites who repent and dwell among the Nephites as Ammonites or Anti-Nephi-Lehites. You have Zoramites heading over to become Lamanites. You have all manner of mixing going on from that point until 4th Nephi, when they cease to have any manner of "ites" at all for 300 years. So while Nephite and Lamanite are originally ethnic terms, by the end of the Book of Mormon, its very much more a matter of political standing. Especially AFTER 4th Nephi, where people decide for themselves whether they will be Nephite or Lamanite.
We could go back and forth about what "dark skin" means in the context of the text as well, but that would be a semantic argument without point. The fact is that it does say that, and I can see why people would interpret that as such, but to myself, I do not believe that the Book of Mormon supports racism. Judging people based on their appearance is repeatedly reviled in the Book of Mormon.
Well the question remains as to why they made the change from "a translation" to "an inspired translation". I do think this has to do with the fact that there are serious issues with the book of abraham including the fact that every egyptologist that has reviewed the facsimile has pointed out that it's just a funerary text and have provided other remarkably similar examples. Many apologists have tried to find a way to explain it and the only tactic that makes any kind of "sense" is that "Yes it's a funerary text but God used it as a vehicle to open up Joseph to revelations about Abraham."I want to say that that's not the case, that people don't think that, but you keep telling me there are people who feel that way about the Book of Mormon. It's my understanding this is the case concerning the Book of Moses, but I've never really sat down to study the history of it. The Book of Abraham, well, I mean, I already accept that he found an ancient record of American prophets, so why not? The ancient world left all kinds of fascinating, if rare, records, so I don't have a hard time incorporating it.
If the Awesome fan art thread has shown us anything it's that you'll click. You'll always click.Oh man, I don't even know if I want to know.
EDIT: Why did I click?
Well that's the thing though it's easy not to feel it's racist when it's not your race. I remember having this discussion with my wife when I was still active in the church and she said largely the same thing. Then I said, ok well let's replace with dark skin with white skin and visa versa and after a bit she was like "Oh yeah, I can see why you'd think this is racist".
And yes there's the whole thing about how they were the most righteous when they weren't aware of that. But you leave out that teaching that the lamanites turned white as they became more righteous. And this was even taught until Kimball's day. Over and over again the history of the church paints a picture of race as something that needs to be overcome. And yes a lot of it comes from the leadership instead of the book to say that it's not in the book is glossing over it at best.
Well the question remains as to why they made the change from "a translation" to "an inspired translation". I do think this has to do with the fact that there are serious issues with the book of abraham including the fact that every egyptologist that has reviewed the facsimile has pointed out that it's just a funerary text and have provided other remarkably similar examples. Many apologists have tried to find a way to explain it and the only tactic that makes any kind of "sense" is that "Yes it's a funerary text but God used it as a vehicle to open up Joseph to revelations about Abraham."
I get the whole "well Joseph Smith could translate one ancient text why not another?" I think that the church is worried about members looking at the issues with the BoA and the kinderhook plates and start thinking the opposite "Well if he faked one why not another?"
If the Awesome fan art thread has shown us anything it's that you'll click. You'll always click.
I want to say that that's not the case, that people don't think that, but you keep telling me there are people who feel that way about the Book of Mormon. It's my understanding this is the case concerning the Book of Moses, but I've never really sat down to study the history of it. The Book of Abraham, well, I mean, I already accept that he found an ancient record of American prophets, so why not? The ancient world left all kinds of fascinating, if rare, records, so I don't have a hard time incorporating it.
Oh man, I don't even know if I want to know.
EDIT: Why did I click?
I won't deny that even I find the whole Book of Abraham hard to understand, but the transition from "translation" to "inspired translation" seems innocuous to me. Adding "Another Testament of Jesus Christ" to the covers of Books of Mormon was done, but it doesn't have any secret significance.
The difference is it seems to be qualifying the statement. It's not really a translation any more if it's an "inspired translation." One means the text literally was translated, the other has a more ambiguous meaning. I don't think it's innocuous at all. Changing the intro from stating the Lamanites were "the principle ancestors" to "among the ancestors" wasn't innocuous either. Both are signs of backpedaling from claims that evidence has now shown to be false. Conversely, adding "Another Testament of Jesus Christ" is just a move to reaffirm that Mormons are indeed Christians, I don't think it changes what the church has always claimed about the Book of Mormon. I almost feel like the multitude of small, insignificant edits on the list are there to just cover the more substantial ones that ex-Mormons are finding and pointing out.
On an unrelated note, Elder Bednar was on campus last night. I didn't go, because I'm a horrible person (I have an excuse, which I feel is somewhat legitimate, but I also feel that any excuse, no matter how praiseworthy, weakens the character of a man.), but I do think it would've been cool to go. I went last year, when Elder Perry was on campus, and that was a fantastic night. It's one thing for me, I think, to watch them on TV during General Conference, and quite another to be there in person when an Apostle is speaking. It's always a moving experience for me to be in the room.
One thing to keep in mind about the Book of Abraham is that the archaeological and linguistic world was busy cracking ancient Egyptian in the early 19th century after the rediscovery of the Rosetta Stone. A full understanding of the language was decades in the making, and Joseph Smith's contemporaries weren't really privy to it.
Thing is, our understanding of ancient Egyptian is pretty good now, and independent translations of the papyri used for the Book of Abraham (they are still around) are not only perfectly possible, they've been done, and the contents are not unique.
There is no definition of apostasy or the great apostasy that the LDS church applies to the early Christian church that does not also apply to itself.
Dude don't think about it that way. If you had something to do, you had something to do and you're not to be reprimanded for having a life outside of the church. It may sound weak coming from an apostate, but I was a true believer once and beat myself up for the same stuff. I can tell you though that your heavenly father does not expect you to spend every free moment studying the scriptures or listening to conference talks. Take it from a wise old sage in his late 20s: be happy with yourself for all the things you do right, don't nitpick yourself to death for the things you feel you could improve upon.
A previous engagement is not an excuse. Its a prior obligation. Short of God himself asking, don't worry about it.
Technically, going and seeing Elder Bednar was the previous engagement. Helping my friend with his homework is the Ox in the mire.
Overall, you are better off serving your fellow man.
Bednar didn't know the difference. I'd guess the friend most definitely did. I'd say the right choice was made.
Bednar didn't know the difference. I'd guess the friend most definitely did. I'd say the right choice was made.
This is functionally equivalent to saying "don't publish".Personally I don't think apologists do themselves any favors by tying themselves up in knots like this. In the day and age of the internet if you're a scholar making scholarly claims on the internet you should have it peer reviewed first. Because it'll get peer reviewed anyway. Except it'll happen in public.
This is functionally equivalent to saying "don't publish".
Haha, but you said "peer reviewed", and that wouldn't really apply in a scholarly sense.Not at all.
You can publish what you want in your apologetic journals and all that.
Haha, but you said "peer reviewed", and that wouldn't really apply in a scholarly sense.
Well to be fair this wouldn't be an issue if the guy had posted something in an apologetic journal. In fact he's done it many times.
Then people would've just been like "it's an apologist guy doing the apologist thing." But to go on Youtube and be like "Egyptologists all know about the abrahamic traditions, etc, etc." with the title "Egyptologist PhD" under your name you gotta know that other egyptologists will come out and say "Nu-uh girlfriend!"
Exactly, this is not the age where bullshit can be openly spewed without any sort of recourse. In the 90's you may have been able to go around doing local firesides and keep local areas in line by making up garbage like this, but nowadays if you're going to reach an audience, you're gonna reach the world, and that means people who know better and can easily respond to the same audience.
The church's walking back the claims in short doses like they just did ("translation" vs. "inspire translation") is a better strategy. To double down on stupidity for which there is no evidence is not.
Also the only other Muhlestein I've known in life was also a giant tool.
So Kotaku posted an article about how well Mormons were dealt with in Fallout New Vegas
really I feel that they didn't really demonize mormons and just made them like other people. I don't particularly feel they went above and beyond or anything.
Still if you wanna read
http://kotaku.com/5988935/im-a-mormon-pop-culture-often-mocks-my-faith-but-fallout-treated-it-right
Holy crap the comments.
Why do I always scroll down to the comments...
Ugh.
@Ronito - based on what I read in the article, it does sound like someone at Oblivion did research or has a background and put that into the game - which among today's games is remarkable (for any religion / religious topics).
Rexburg is the most godforsaken place on earth. I weep for those stuck there.
At least I can purchase Guarana' here. And the girls are easy on the eyes. And the streambeds would've been great fun to play in as a kid.
The real problem is that snowball fights are outlawed. Town has an amazing amount of snow, utterly wasted because errybody is afraid to cut loose and have fun.
I'm about to Footloose this stuff.
Wait, really? Why?
Rexburg is like Provo without anything to do. And worse people.
There are things to do outside of Rexburg, but the only things to do in the town are study, play video games, and break honor code.