Comparison with the Book of Mormon
The Book of Mormon shares some thematic elements with View of the Hebrews. Both books quote extensively from the Old Testament prophecies of the Book of Isaiah; describe the future gathering of Israel and restoration of the Ten Lost Tribes; propose the peopling of the New World from the Old via a long sea journey; declare a religious motive for the migration; divide the migrants into civilized and uncivilized groups with long wars between them and the eventual destruction of the civilized by the uncivilized; assume that Native Americans were descended from Israelites and their languages from Hebrew; include a change of government from monarchy to republican; and suggest that the gospel was preached in ancient America. [7]
Early Mormons occasionally cited the View of the Hebrews to support the authenticity of the Book of Mormon. [8] In the early 20th century, Mormon historian B. H. Roberts noted the parallels between View of the Hebrews and the Book of Mormon and explored the possibility Joseph Smith had used View of the Hebrews as a source in composing the Book of Mormon, or that he was at least influenced by the popular 19th-century ideas expounded in the earlier work. [9] It is unknown whether Joseph Smith had access to View of the Hebrews when he dictated the Book of Mormon in 1829 and 1830; he did quote from View of the Hebrews in 1842. [10]
Oliver Cowdery, who later served as Joseph Smith's scribe for the Book of Mormon, lived in the same small Vermont town as Ethan Smith and may have attended the Congregational church where the latter was pastor for five years. Cowdery may have passed on knowledge of the book to Joseph Smith. [11] Unsurprisingly, Mormon apologists have argued that the parallels between the works are weak or over-emphasized. [12] Larry Morris, a Mormon apologist, has argued that "the theory of an Ethan Smith–Cowdery association is not supported by the documents." [13]
When in 1922 Mormon apologist B. H. Roberts [14] was asked by church leaders to compare View of the Hebrews and the Book of Mormon, he produced a confidential report, later published as Studies of the Book of Mormon , that noted eighteen points of similarity. [15] [16]
Fawn M. Brodie, the first important historian to write a non-hagiographic biography of Joseph Smith, [17] proposed that Joseph Smith's theory of the Hebraic origin of the American Indians came "chiefly" from View of the Hebrews. "It may never be proved that Joseph saw View of the Hebrews before writing the Book of Mormon," wrote Brodie in 1945, "but the striking parallelisms between the two books hardly leave a case for mere coincidence." [18]
The Book of Mormon is a religious text of the Latter Day Saint movement, first published in 1830 by Joseph Smith as The Book of Mormon: An Account Written by the Hand of Mormon upon Plates Taken from the Plates of Nephi. According to Smith's account and the book's narrative, the Book was originally engraved in otherwise unknown characters on golden plates by ancient prophets; the last prophet to contribute to the book, Moroni, had buried it in what is present-day Manchester, New York and then appeared in a vision to Smith in 1827, revealing the location of the plates and instructing him to translate the plates into English. The more widely accepted view is that Smith authored the Book, drawing, consciously or subconsciously, on material and ideas from his contemporary 19th-century environment, rather than translating an ancient record.
Mormons are a religious and cultural group related to Mormonism, the principal branch of the Latter Day Saint movement started by Joseph Smith in upstate New York during the 1820s. After Smith's death in 1844, the movement split into several groups following different leaders; the majority followed Brigham Young, while smaller groups followed Joseph Smith III, Sidney Rigdon, and James Strang. Most of these smaller groups eventually merged into the Community of Christ, and the term Mormon typically refers to members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, as today, this branch is far larger than all the others combined. People who identify as Mormons may also be independently religious, secular, and non-practicing or belong to other denominations. Since 2018, the LDS Church has emphasized a desire for its members be referred to as "members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints", or more simply as "Latter-day Saints".
Mormonism is the theology and religious tradition of the Latter Day Saint movement of Restorationist Christianity started by Joseph Smith in Western New York in the 1820s and 1830s. As a label, Mormonism has been applied to various aspects of the Latter Day Saint movement, although there has been a recent push from the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints to distance themselves from this label. A historian, Sydney E. Ahlstrom, wrote in 1982 that, depending on the context, the term Mormonism could refer to “a sect, a mystery cult, a new religion, a church, a people, a nation, or an American subculture; indeed, at different times and places it is all of these."
Oliver H. P. Cowdery was an American religious leader who, with Joseph Smith, was an important participant in the formative period of the Latter Day Saint movement between 1829 and 1836. He was the first baptized Latter Day Saint, one of the Three Witnesses of the Book of Mormon's golden plates, one of the first Latter Day Saint apostles and the Assistant President of the Church.
According to most adherents of the Latter Day Saint movement, the Book of Mormon is a 19th-century translation of a record of ancient inhabitants of the American continent, which was written in a script which the book refers to as "reformed Egyptian". Mainstream modern linguistic evidence has failed to find any reliable evidence of a language matching this description - or indeed, any evidence of Old World linguistic influences in the New World whatsoever.
The Mormon religion is predicated on what are said to be historical events such as the First Vision of Joseph Smith and the historicity of the Book of Mormon, which describes a detailed pre-Columbian history of the Americas. Joseph Fielding Smith, the tenth president of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, declared that "Mormonism, as it is called, must stand or fall on the story of Joseph Smith. He was either a prophet of God, divinely called, properly appointed and commissioned, or he was one of the biggest frauds this world has ever seen. There is no middle ground." As Jan Shipps has written, "Mormonism, unlike other modern religions, is a faith cast in the form of history," and until after World War II, Mormons did not critically examine the historical underpinnings of their faith; any "profane" investigation of the church's history was perceived "as trespassing on forbidden ground."
No Man Knows My History: The Life of Joseph Smith is a 1945 book by Fawn M. Brodie that was one of the first significant non-hagiographic biographies of Joseph Smith, the progenitor of the Latter Day Saint movement. No Man Knows My History was influential in the development of Mormon history as a scholarly field. However, scholars have since criticized the book for its methodological deficiencies, factual errors, and overt hostility to Smith.
Studies of the Book of Mormon is a collection of essays written at the beginning of the 20th century by B. H. Roberts (1857–1933), a general authority of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, which examine the validity of the Book of Mormon as a translation of an ancient American source.
The Spalding–Rigdon theory of Book of Mormon authorship is the theory that the Book of Mormon was partly plagiarized from an unpublished manuscript by Solomon Spalding. The theory first appeared in print in E. D. Howe's 1834 book Mormonism Unvailed [sic]. The theory is that Spalding's manuscript was stolen by Sidney Rigdon, who used it in collusion with Joseph Smith and Oliver Cowdery to produce the Book of Mormon. Rigdon claimed that he was converted to the Latter Day Saint movement by reading The Book of Mormon, but Howe argued that this story was a later invention to hide the book's true origin.
Many members of the Latter Day Saint movement believe that the Book of Mormon is historically accurate. Most, but not all, Latter Day Saints hold the book's connection to ancient American history as an article of their faith. This view finds no confirmation outside of the movement in the broader scientific and academic communities. Relevant archaeological, historical, and scientific facts are not consistent with the Book of Mormon being an ancient record of actual historical events.
Adherents to the Latter Day Saint movement view the Book of Mormon as a work of divinely inspired scripture, which was written by ancient prophets in the ancient Americas. Adherents mostly believe Joseph Smith's account of translating ancient golden plates inscribed by prophets. Smith preached that the angel Moroni, a prophet in the Book of Mormon, directed him in the 1820s to a hill near his home in Palmyra, New York, where the plates were buried. An often repeated and upheld as convincing claim by adherents that the story is true is that besides Smith himself, there were at least 11 witnesses who said they saw the plates in 1829, three that claimed to also have been visited by an angel, and other witnesses who observed Smith dictating parts of the text that eventually became the Book of Mormon.
The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints has been subject to criticism and sometimes discrimination since its inception.
The standard works of Mormonism—the largest denomination of which is the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints —have been the subject of various criticisms. Latter-day Saints believe the Book of Mormon is a sacred text with the same divine authority as the Bible; both are considered complementary to each other. Other Mormon sacred texts include the Pearl of Great Price and Doctrine and Covenants, which are also recognized as scripture. Religious and scholarly critics outside Mormonism have disputed Mormonism's unique scriptures, questioning the traditional narrative of how these books came to light and the extent to which they describe actual events. Critics cite research in history, archeology, and other disciplines to support their contentions.
The origins, authenticity, and historicity of the Book of Mormon have been subject to considerable criticism from scholars and skeptics since it was first published in 1830. The Book of Mormon is a sacred text of the Latter Day Saint movement, which adherents believe contains writings of ancient prophets who lived on the American continent from approximately 2200 BC to AD 421. It was first published in March 1830 by Joseph Smith as The Book of Mormon: An Account Written by the Hand of Mormon upon Plates Taken from the Plates of Nephi, who said that it had been written in otherwise unknown characters referred to as "reformed Egyptian" engraved on golden plates that he personally transcribed. Contemporary followers of the Latter Day Saint movement typically regard the text primarily as scripture, but also as a historical record of God's dealings with the ancient inhabitants of the Americas.
No, Ma'am, That's Not History is a short work written by Hugh Nibley to criticize Fawn M. Brodie's biography of Joseph Smith, No Man Knows My History. Nibley accuses Brodie of inconsistency and improper historical methodology. Scholars have criticized No, Ma'am for using the same kind of hyperbole that Nibley critiques in Brodie. Nibley's defenders explain that his acerbic satire does use similar rhetorical tools as Brodie does, which is part of its attention-grabbing intent. In 1999, The Salt Lake Tribune said the book "was wildly popular in Utah".
Mormon studies is the interdisciplinary academic study of the beliefs, practices, history and culture of individuals and denominations belonging to the Latter Day Saint movement, a religious movement associated with the Book of Mormon, though not all churches and members of the Latter Day Saint movement identify with the terms Mormon or Mormonism. Denominations of the Latter Day Saint movement include the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, by far the largest, as well as the Community of Christ (CoC) and other smaller groups, include some categorized under the umbrella term Mormon fundamentalism.
Ethan Smith was a New England Congregationalist clergyman in the United States who wrote View of the Hebrews (1823), a book that argued that Native Americans were descended from the Ten Lost Tribes of Israel. His position was not uncommon among religious scholars, who based their history on the Bible.
This is a bibliography of works on the Latter Day Saint movement.
The legacy of Joseph Smith includes the immediate aftermath of Smith's killing, among various competing denominations, the status of his family and the church he founded, and a scholarly assessment of his life and religion. Although Smith was killed in 1844, he attracted thousands of devoted followers before his death, and millions in the century that followed. Among Mormons, he is generally regarded as a prophet on par with Moses and Elijah. In a 2015 compilation of the 100 Most Significant Americans of All Time, Smithsonian magazine ranked Smith first in the category of religious figures.
