"Why Joseph Smith's Use of Seer Stones Make More Sense Than You Thought"

[Not Buying It]

I'm not sure that an article defending the use of magic rocks needs a lot of commentary from me, but for those of you with a high tolerance for nonsense, I present to you a link to an LDS Living article that is sure to convince your non-member friends that there is nothing crazy about believing in seer stones:

http://www.ldsliving.com/Why-Joseph-s-U ... ht/s/84018


Enjoy!

[Red Ryder]

Why did I click and read? Nonsense indeed.

Prophetic training wheels? I'm starting to chuckle here. Money digging experiences as cultural processes?

“Some Mormon historians have argued that Joseph Smith used his seer stones as a crutch before he was able to receive revelation directly from God by inspiration without a device to help him. By implication, even though God apparently sanctioned seer stones, they were described as cultural tools, essentially prophetic ‘training wheels.’ This didactic model addresses Joseph Smith's money-digging experiences by admitting that he used seer stones in a cultural way to find buried treasure, then used the same cultural process to learn how to receive revelation from God.”

Every member in the celestial kingdom will use a seer stone? There's one more reason to do your home teaching every month!

“Joseph Smith embraced the idea of seer stones within his prophetic calling, eventually infusing them with deeper religious meaning that affected Mormon theology more broadly. Even if not every prophet or member would use a seer stone on earth, everyone in the celestial kingdom would.

I really can't believe the church took the approach to display the brown seer stone to the world and then let others write books to rationalize the "normalcy" of it. Prophetic training wheels?

Was Fanny Alger a "prophetic training wheel" for the highly anticipated restoration of polygamy? That makes more sense than you thought!

[RubinHighlander]

Yup, that was a waist of time and just confirmation as to the status quo.

The comments section is always the most entertaining. Here's a good one:

When we are able to transcend the questions our doubts engender to the intellectual quietude where the Spirit whispers to us the questions we should be asking, the questions God wants us to ask, and then LIVE the answers we receive, we can learn what personal revelation really means.

Wow dude, really? You be drinking that koolaid like it's the end of a 24 hour fast! No additional comment needed there.

Or this very typical bury your head in the sand method:

I frankly don't want/need to speculate about seer stones. I need to focus on Gospel basics, thank you very much.

I still think my favorite piece of work by LDS Living is the one on the BoA and how well it explains how the universe works (Newtonian Universe Theory). Good think the BoM does not say the world is flat.

[Luther Heggs]

I didn't know Joseph Smith "found" treasure with the seer stone (as they imply) I thought he failed to find treasure so he only tried (Yoda notwithstanding).

[wtfluff]

I really can't believe the church took the approach to display the brown seer stone to the world and then let others write books to rationalize the "normalcy" of it. Prophetic training wheels?

Was Fanny Alger a "prophetic training wheel" for the highly anticipated restoration of polygamy? That makes more sense than you thought!

Which begs the question: Do all prophets start out using, and learning from the same types of training wheels? If so, why do they hide it from us?

I didn't know Joseph Smith "found" treasure with the seer stone (as they imply) I thought he failed to find treasure so he only tried (Yoda notwithstanding).

He didn't ever find any treasure. If he had, he probably would have never written a book, or created a religion to make money, as he would have already been rich!

(Which would have saved a lot of us much pain and suffering...)

[20/20hind]

His use of his magic rock landed him in court. They failed to mention that. In fact he had legal problems through out his life including bank fraud. Which he fled to avoid prosecution. TBM hat...Satan was after him.. Normal person..this guy is a criminal and anything he says should be suspect. Perfect guy to start a religion..

[Corsair]

They are breathing the fumes from their own gaslighting. Seer stones might make sense if they worked in any functional way. No one today relies upon them either in or out of the church. They were considered low class "folk magic" back in 1830 and connotations have not improved in the 21st century. The one, singular "success" that Joseph Smith had with seer stones was the Book of Mormon. I will grant that this sounds pretty amazing to faithful Mormons. But how on earth could Joseph have seriously considered that he would have success with this religious book when seer stones had yielded nothing for him in the past? The various answers are unflattering. Either Joseph was a conman or he was not at all a critical thinker. He was probably devout in either situation, but he was not seriously considering a string of successes that would have led to faith in a seer stone facilitated translation. It's more likely that this was a good mechanism to fool himself and others about the translation process.

I suppose we could get a chance in the next few weeks to talk about the seer stone in Gospel Doctrine class. Suppose that you are lucky enough to have Richard Bushman teaching your class and Tyrell Givens as your bishop. Still, I'm guessing that their will be this low level feeling that this is just a little bit weird at best. Talking about current use of seer stones by Thomas Monson will not be welcome speculation even in the most scholarly of wards. Some call for seriousness about this sacred subject will be invoked.

[The Beast]

Yeah an article on the brown swirly seer stone that uses two clear crystals set into a crude spectacle frame as an illustration. They just can't help themselves, can they? Yeesh!

[Zadok]

He didn't ever find any treasure. If he had, he probably would have never written a book, or created a religion to make money, as he would have already been rich!

(Which would have saved a lot of us much pain and suffering...)

Considering the money and lifestyle he enjoyed, I'll opine that he was successful making money from his religion. Sure it cost him his life, but that is better, IMHO, than life in prison.