Is there a single unique truth claim of Mormonism that holds up?

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jfro18
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Is there a single unique truth claim of Mormonism that holds up?

Post by jfro18 » Thu Dec 15, 2022 7:04 pm

I often see people say that the Mormon church gets more right than wrong (Jim Bennett uses it a lot among others), but is there a single truth claim from Joseph Smith or the doctrines of Mormonism that has held up against advances in science, history, biblical scholarship, etc?

At some point it becomes kind of silly to look at what Joseph Smith claimed from God vs what we know today, but I can't think of a single unique Mormon truth claim that has withstood the last 200 years... I'm sure there are some that might be in the 'possible' camp though?

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RubinHighlander
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Re: Is there a single unique truth claim of Mormonism that holds up?

Post by RubinHighlander » Fri Dec 16, 2022 7:14 am

"The natural man is an enemy to God."

This one was likely parroted, as were most of the other dogmas and ideas that JS wove into his complex tapestry of BS. This is the quote came to mind when I read the title of this thread. IMO the invention of God by men is one of the single most harmful ideas run amok for our species, a weird tribality trait of our evolution. Most of the big brained sapiens just can't handle the itchiness of the gaps in knowledge, they need filler, no matter it's truthfulness. Those who could offer crazy but somehow believable explanations to fill the gaps with bullshit became popular authority figures. We have plenty of recorded history now to show us how well that's played out for us on this planet and how it continues to control and influence so much of the human experience. The narcissists quickly discovered this new god/supernatural gap filler as an amazingly effective tool at taking advantage of and controlling others. Thus, man-made gods are my enemy, which is an eternal truth for me.

What the mormon church get's right is the ability to generate huge amounts of wealth for a few off the backs of many...tax free!
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Hagoth
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Re: Is there a single unique truth claim of Mormonism that holds up?

Post by Hagoth » Fri Dec 16, 2022 7:56 am

I'm wracking my brain and I really can't think of any.

The closest I can think of is that it turns out that some ancient people actually did write on metal plates from time to time, but that's not really as impressive as Mormons like to make it, because there's nothing they didn't write on. It would be even more surprising if no one else never wrote on metal. The problem, of course, is that there was none of this going on in the Americas, and there was no metallurgy at all in Central and North America during BoM times, except for the occasional cold-hammering of pure copper and gold.

The BoA papyri SHOULD be the slam dunk that verifies all of Joseph Smith's claims, but it's about as close to a smoking gun as you could ask for. Pretty much all of the putative bullseyes in the BoA facsimiles are nothing-burgers. The closest thing to a hit is that Joseph claimed the writing above the heads of the individuals in Facsimile 3 were their names. That turned out to be correct, but his translations of them were about as wrong as they could possibly be. Most people would probably conclude that those scribbles are the names of the people directly beneath them.

I think some of Joseph's theology answered some questions better than traditional Christianity, like the Problem of Evil, but only because he created a God that didn't adhere to the Christian world's strict require definitions. Joseph's God was an evolved alien who could "cease to be God" if he didn't play by someone else's rules.
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jfro18
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Re: Is there a single unique truth claim of Mormonism that holds up?

Post by jfro18 » Fri Dec 16, 2022 8:13 am

Hagoth wrote:
Fri Dec 16, 2022 7:56 am
I think some of Joseph's theology answered some questions better than traditional Christianity, like the Problem of Evil, but only because he created a God that didn't adhere to the Christian world's strict require definitions. Joseph's God was an evolved alien who could "cease to be God" if he didn't play by someone else's rules.
This makes me view the God of Mormonism like a short tempered, petty version of Superman.

The God of Mormonism is from another planet and has unlimited powers and abilities, yet chooses instead to actively save people to destroy civilizations that don't live up to his expectations.

Although Superman doesn't let a few old dudes speak for him, so I guess that's a big difference.

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Re: Is there a single unique truth claim of Mormonism that holds up?

Post by Ghost » Fri Dec 16, 2022 8:23 am

Hagoth wrote:
Fri Dec 16, 2022 7:56 am
I think some of Joseph's theology answered some questions better than traditional Christianity, like the Problem of Evil . . . .
Yes, this is what comes to mind for me as well. Not just the definition of God, but the concept of premortal life and everyone being coeternal with God.

But of course things like this only solve problems that aren't really problems if the original material is similarly made up.

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deacon blues
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Re: Is there a single unique truth claim of Mormonism that holds up?

Post by deacon blues » Fri Dec 16, 2022 11:33 am

The Civil War prophecy was partly fulfilled. Note that in 1832 south Carolina was considering leaving the Union over a tariff dispute.
87:1 The war started in South Carolina. :)
87:2 War poured out on all nations starting there. :( :oops: What if it said Sarajevo and 1917?
87:3South vs. North. South called on Great Britain and other nations. :)
87:4 After many days slaves would rise up. :cry: :oops:
87:5 The Remnant (Indians) would vex the Gentiles. :( :oops: what if it said vex Custer? Or the Utah Mormons?
87:6 famine, plague, earthquake, a consumption of all things. :cry: :oops:
87:7 behold it cometh quickly. :cry: :oops: :roll:
:oops: In 1838 Parley Pratt printed a pamphlet that said: Now, Mr. Sunderland, you have something definite and tangible, the time, the manner, the means, the names, the dates; and I will state as a prophesy, that there will not be an unbelieving Gentile upon this continent 50 years hence; and if they are not greatly scourged, and in a great measure overthrown, within five or ten years from this date, then the Book of Mormon will have proved itself false. :cry: :cry: :oops:
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Re: Is there a single unique truth claim of Mormonism that holds up?

Post by Zeezrom » Fri Dec 16, 2022 12:38 pm

deacon blues wrote:
Fri Dec 16, 2022 11:33 am
The Civil War prophecy was partly fulfilled. Note that in 1832 south Carolina was considering leaving the Union over a tariff dispute.
87:1 The war started in South Carolina. :)
87:2 War poured out on all nations starting there. :( :oops: What if it said Sarajevo and 1917?
87:3South vs. North. South called on Great Britain and other nations. :)
87:4 After many days slaves would rise up. :cry: :oops:
87:5 The Remnant (Indians) would vex the Gentiles. :( :oops: what if it said vex Custer? Or the Utah Mormons?
87:6 famine, plague, earthquake, a consumption of all things. :cry: :oops:
87:7 behold it cometh quickly. :cry: :oops: :roll:
:oops: In 1838 Parley Pratt printed a pamphlet that said: Now, Mr. Sunderland, you have something definite and tangible, the time, the manner, the means, the names, the dates; and I will state as a prophesy, that there will not be an unbelieving Gentile upon this continent 50 years hence; and if they are not greatly scourged, and in a great measure overthrown, within five or ten years from this date, then the Book of Mormon will have proved itself false. :cry: :cry: :oops:
I thought of the Civil War and South Carolina D&C prophecy as well. One interesting side note I learned when prepping as an Institute Teacher: the civil war section was not included in the D&C until AFTER the Civil War. It always looks more impressive when you cherry pick the one out of many prophecies that didn’t come true for inclusion. And even this one prophecy “close enough” to make it into scripture isn’t really that close

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Re: Is there a single unique truth claim of Mormonism that holds up?

Post by alas » Fri Dec 16, 2022 2:14 pm

How about the idea that if we have a father in heaven, then we must have a mother also?

But it isn’t really unique, because most ancient religions had goddesses as well as gods. It is also kind of a problem created by the very gendered and physical Mormon God. If God was seen as a being who is outside of our human concept of gender and sex, then one creator God, who has no gender or physical body would be fine. We don’t need a female God represented unless our concept of God is *male*. If God is genderless, bodyless, and not in any way our “father” just creator, as most Christians believe, then a “mother in heaven” is meaningless.

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Re: Is there a single unique truth claim of Mormonism that holds up?

Post by Phil Lurkerman » Fri Dec 16, 2022 5:24 pm

This is an interesting question and got me wondering if any religious truth claims could be said to "hold up"?

I guess it depends how we define "hold up," but I actually could not think of anything. The earth certainly seems to be older than the traditional Christian creation story indicates, there is no good evidence for a worldwide flood, no evidence that a literal Adam and Eve could have been the only ancestors of all humanity, no evidence that human languages all arose during an event at the Tower of Babel. My understanding is that there is limited evidence that many of the major Old Testament figures were literal individuals or that important events such as Abraham attempting to sacrifice Isaac occurred. Even the evidence for a historical Jesus is limited. I don't have a strong enough grasp of other world religions and Indigenous beliefs to offer more diverse examples, but it seems like they all run into the same challenge in the modern era.

Perhaps it is not just that unique Mormon truth claims don't hold up. To some degree they suffer from emerging more recently and thus being less ingrained and accepted by society, i.e., the LDS claims are wacky but so are all the other ones - they just got here first.
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Re: Is there a single unique truth claim of Mormonism that holds up?

Post by Hagoth » Tue Dec 20, 2022 6:43 am

Zeezrom wrote:
Fri Dec 16, 2022 12:38 pm
I thought of the Civil War and South Carolina D&C prophecy as well. One interesting side note I learned when prepping as an Institute Teacher: the civil war section was not included in the D&C until AFTER the Civil War. It always looks more impressive when you cherry pick the one out of many prophecies that didn’t come true for inclusion. And even this one prophecy “close enough” to make it into scripture isn’t really that close
Also, if you leave out the stuff that was already being speculated in the newspapers at the time Joseph wrote it, the "prophesy" is very inaccurate. Kind of like the Word of Wisdom. It's a collection of contemporary health fads, but it lacks any insight or knowledge of scientific reality (e.g. germs, boiling water, health benefits of tea).
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Re: Is there a single unique truth claim of Mormonism that holds up?

Post by Spicy McHaggis » Tue Dec 20, 2022 4:05 pm

Maybe this isn't very relatable to the question but take a look at the claim that Nephi made a high quality bow out of steel. Think about what it would take to do that: Nephi would have to mine the ore. Make a large smelter. After the ore was smelted he would have to have a blast furnace. Then he would need an anvil & hammer or a mold that would make it so the consistency of the bow flexing was even throughout, otherwise the bow would never shoot straight.

I do not believe there is any way one man could do all the work required to make a high quality steel bow in less than several months and more likely it would take years. Wasn't he supposed to be hunting with the bow? If he needed the bow to hunt, how could he devote all that energy & time to making a bow? He would already have access to plenty of food just to mine the ore which is just the first step.

So, Nephi making a bow out of steel just to hunt. That makes no sense. At all.

Then we can talk about wooden submarines with livestock & beehives in the ocean for 344 days.

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Re: Is there a single unique truth claim of Mormonism that holds up?

Post by LSOF » Tue Dec 20, 2022 8:20 pm

Spicy McHaggis wrote:
Tue Dec 20, 2022 4:05 pm
Maybe this isn't very relatable to the question but take a look at the claim that Nephi made a high quality bow out of steel. Think about what it would take to do that: Nephi would have to mine the ore. Make a large smelter. After the ore was smelted he would have to have a blast furnace. Then he would need an anvil & hammer or a mold that would make it so the consistency of the bow flexing was even throughout, otherwise the bow would never shoot straight.

I do not believe there is any way one man could do all the work required to make a high quality steel bow in less than several months and more likely it would take years. Wasn't he supposed to be hunting with the bow? If he needed the bow to hunt, how could he devote all that energy & time to making a bow? He would already have access to plenty of food just to mine the ore which is just the first step.

So, Nephi making a bow out of steel just to hunt. That makes no sense. At all.

Then we can talk about wooden submarines with livestock & beehives in the ocean for 344 days.
The BoM says he made a bow out of wood to replace his broken steel bow.
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Re: Is there a single unique truth claim of Mormonism that holds up?

Post by Hagoth » Wed Dec 21, 2022 7:44 am

LSOF wrote:
Tue Dec 20, 2022 8:20 pm
The BoM says he made a bow out of wood to replace his broken steel bow.
Which is even worse in some ways. It means that Nephi's original bow would have been something he bought in the marketplace, so they should be common items in the archaeological record. But nope, no such thing. Nobody used metal bows. It was a poetic use of the word by the writer if 2 Samuel.

What really happened here is that Joseph Smith borrowed the idea of a steel bow from 2 Samuel 22:35 where the King James translators mistranslated bronze as steel. This is really significant because ONLY the KJV translators made this mistake. Every other translation says either bronze or brass.

Quite a coincidence that Nephi made the same mistake when he wrote the story in Hebrew using Egyptian characters, particularly since he lived in a time before steel, when no one was making steel swords, or that the seer stone took such a drastic detour to give Joseph the wrong word.

Apologists will tell you that "steel" in the BoM really means bronze - that's why it lost its spring. This, of course, is idiotic. Why would people who have been using bows for centuries make a bow out of a very expensive and difficult to work material that didn't even maintain the single most important attribute of a bow - springiness. Especially when cheap wood, the ideal bow-making material, is everywhere to be found. And what hunter wants to lug around a heavy metal bow that doesn't work as well as a light wooden bow?
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Re: Is there a single unique truth claim of Mormonism that holds up?

Post by Spicy McHaggis » Wed Dec 21, 2022 11:31 am

[/quote]The BoM says he made a bow out of wood to replace his broken steel bow.[/quote]

Thanks for clarifying. It's been a long time since I've read it and for some reason I had it in my mind that Nephi made the steel bow out there in the wilderness.

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Re: Is there a single unique truth claim of Mormonism that holds up?

Post by Hagoth » Fri Dec 23, 2022 7:54 am

Spicy McHaggis wrote:
Wed Dec 21, 2022 11:31 am
Thanks for clarifying. It's been a long time since I've read it and for some reason I had it in my mind that Nephi made the steel bow out there in the wilderness.
There's your problem right there Spicy! If you were reading and praying about it every day, Satan wouldn't be putting these doubts in your head.
“The easy confidence with which I know another man's religion is folly teaches me to suspect that my own is also.” -Mark Twain

Jesus: "The Kingdom of God is within you." The Buddha: "Be your own light."

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alas
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Re: Is there a single unique truth claim of Mormonism that holds up?

Post by alas » Fri Dec 23, 2022 11:45 am

Hagoth wrote:
Fri Dec 23, 2022 7:54 am
Spicy McHaggis wrote:
Wed Dec 21, 2022 11:31 am
Thanks for clarifying. It's been a long time since I've read it and for some reason I had it in my mind that Nephi made the steel bow out there in the wilderness.
There's your problem right there Spicy! If you were reading and praying about it every day, Satan wouldn't be putting these doubts in your head.
My trouble was that as I read the BoM, I kept thinking how it sounded like a tall tale told by Joseph Smith, especially the Nephi stuff. Nephi sounded too much like Joseph was using himself as the base for his hero in the story he was making up. Somehow the ego I saw in Joseph just fit. Reminds me of Trumps trading cards and how he sees himself as some kind of super hero.

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Re: Is there a single unique truth claim of Mormonism that holds up?

Post by Cnsl1 » Sat Dec 24, 2022 3:36 pm

Idk if this is a prophecy, but there is the tale that Joseph was told by God that if he saw a rainbow he could go ahead and plant the crops cuz that meant Jesus wasn't coming back right away and there would be time to harvest those crops.

So... I've seen lots of rainbows in my day and Jesus hasn't come back, so... can we count these perfect negative correlations as multiple prophecies fulfilled?

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Re: Is there a single unique truth claim of Mormonism that holds up?

Post by deacon blues » Sun Dec 25, 2022 11:04 am

The church probably helped keep me from smoking, so that is a good thing they taught. But then I wonder about my church friends who started smoking as an act of rebellion, and my non-church friends who didn't. :roll:
God is Love. God is Truth. The greatest problem with organized religion is that the organization becomes god, rather than a means of serving God.

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