"It is chloroform in print. If Joseph Smith composed this book, the act was a miracle--keeping awake while he did it was, at any rate. If he, according to tradition, merely translated it from certain ancient and mysteriously-engraved plates of copper, which he declares he found under a stone, in an out-of-the-way locality, the work of translating was equally a miracle, for the same reason."
"Whenever he found his speech growing too modern--which was about every sentence or two—he ladled in a few such Scriptural phrases as 'exceeding sore,' 'and it came to pass,' etc., and made things satisfactory again. 'And it came to pass' was his pet. If he had left that out, his Bible would have been only a pamphlet."
On the Testimony of the Three Witnesses: "Some people have to have a world of evidence before they can come anywhere in the neighborhood of believing anything; but for me, when a man tells me that he has 'seen the engravings which are upon the plates,' and not only that, but an angel was there at the time, and saw him see them, and probably took his receipt for it, I am very far on the road to conviction, no matter whether I ever heard of that man before or not, and even if I do not know the name of the angel, or his nationality either."
On the Testimony of the Eight Witnesses: "And when I am far on the road to conviction, and eight men, be they grammatical or otherwise, come forward and tell me that they have seen the plates too; and not only seen those plates but 'hefted' them, I am convinced. I could not feel more satisfied and at rest if the entire Whitmer family had testified."
On the endless Jaredite battles toward the end of the Book of Mormon: "It seems a pity he did not finish, for after all his dreary former chapters of commonplace, he stopped just as he was in danger of becoming interesting."
Leah, you are correct in thinking that I'd enjoy this Funny Friday. Actually, I have laughed at all of your Funny Friday posts because I have a sense of humor (though I don't watch South Park, and its not because of a my trying to be moral and thinking that it is evil or something but rather I just don't enjoy it that much, I have seen the episode on mormons and it cracks me up). That does not automatically mean that I agree with what they are joking about, from a theological standpoint, but that I think humor can be found in just about anything. I even think that God has a sense of humor.
ReplyDeleteAt any rate, other than atheism, mormonism is something I take particular interest in. Because I look at the world through Christian spectacles, and I think because of the environment in which I was raised, I have a developed a special interest in mormonism. Through your atheistic spectacles I would imagine that mormonism and christianity are no different and for all intense purposes are the same....religion. But from my perspective, that of a Christian, I have many theological issues with mormonism to the extent that I challenge its claim to be a "Christian" religion, despite the fact that Jesus Christ is found in its name (I say this because I have heard this as a reason for why it is a Christian religion).
So, thanks for sharing Mark Twain's perspective. I will read the rest of the article. I think that his perspective is particularly interesting, from what I read on this post, because he was actually living at the advent of mormonism.
John says his seminary teacher advised his class that if they were having trouble sleeping, they should read a few chapters from the Book of Mormon before bed. Seriously.
ReplyDeleteI've yet to read through the whole thing on my own; I don't know if I ever will. When I try to read it I usually find myself reading the same sentence over and over again, because my mind's busy thinking about more interesting things. I don't know how you managed to get through the whole thing in one weekend.
Patrik, I'm not a huge South Park fan either, but the episode on the Mormons is immortally hilarious.
ReplyDeleteMike, I read the BoM completely through three times, twice in English and once in Spanish. Think of all those hours of my life that I'll never get back!
@Leah: That's kind of the same feeling I had when I finished Final Fantasy VII. It had a timer that showed how long it took me to finish. It was well over 100 hours and I was a little shocked, but I still think it was worth it.
ReplyDeleteHey me too. It was great fun though. Even more sickening is the fact that I logged over 75 days of play time on FFXI. Still I'd rather spend it doing that than who knows how many total hours I've spent at church. Let's see (3hrs * 52wks * 17yrs = 110.5days) Give or take some when I skipped church but then was forced to take Seminary.
ReplyDeleteLeah, you are correct in thinking that I'd enjoy this Funny Friday. Actually, I have laughed at all of your Funny Friday posts because I have a sense of humor (though I don't watch South Park, and its not because of a my trying to be moral and thinking that it is evil or something but rather I just don't enjoy it that much, I have seen the episode on mormons and it cracks me up). That does not automatically mean that I agree with what they are joking about, from a theological standpoint, but that I think humor can be found in just about anything. I even think that God has a sense of humor.
ReplyDeleteAt any rate, other than atheism, mormonism is something I take particular interest in. Because I look at the world through Christian spectacles, and I think because of the environment in which I was raised, I have a developed a special interest in mormonism. Through your atheistic spectacles I would imagine that mormonism and christianity are no different and for all intense purposes are the same....religion. But from my perspective, that of a Christian, I have many theological issues with mormonism to the extent that I challenge its claim to be a "Christian" religion, despite the fact that Jesus Christ is found in its name (I say this because I have heard this as a reason for why it is a Christian religion).
So, thanks for sharing Mark Twain's perspective. I will read the rest of the article. I think that his perspective is particularly interesting, from what I read on this post, because he was actually living at the advent of mormonism.