It really is a good example of how if you put your mind to it and you have no talent, but someone gives you some free microphones, you can accomplish anything.
Standard of Truth · Season 4 · Episode 1 · 1:21:50
Preface to the Book of Mormon
The 1830 Book of Mormon opened with a preface in Joseph Smith's own voice warning about the stolen 116 pages, and later editions quietly dropped it.
Press play above. The page follows along.
The question ·
What did the very first reader of the Book of Mormon see in its original 1830 preface, and why did it later disappear?
Richard
Season 4 opens with free trials, a mailbag from Valerie, a Texas seminary teacher who can't find the quotes she wrote in her margins, and Richard's 'Rick Dukes' top five opening lines. The list tops out with "In the beginning," and then Gerrit turns to the first words a reader saw in the 1830 Book of Mormon: Joseph's preface explaining why he won't retranslate the stolen 116 pages. Gerrit uses it to talk about Words of Mormon and Satan's real opposition, then reads the 1837 preface by Parley Pratt about edits made for clarity. He ends with Joseph's letters quoting the Book of Mormon, from Vienna Jaques to N. C. Saxton, a warning about treating prophets as wrong whenever we disagree, and Joseph's Liberty Jail promise that 'Mormonism' will stand.
Who comes upJoseph SmithMartin HarrisMormonParley P. PrattOliver CowderyVienna JaquesN. C. SaxtonOrson PrattBrigham YoungLilburn W. BoggsSatan
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Welcome to season four
Richard announces a seven-day premium free trial, and Gerrit worries about the missionaries.
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311 moments · tap a time to play from thereIntro Welcome to the Standard of Truth Podcast. In this podcast, Dr. Gerrit Dirkmaat and Professor Richard LeDuc explore the early history of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and the life and teachings of Prophet Joseph Smith. They examine the original historical sources and provide context for events of the past. They approach the history of the Church with faith, expertise and humor.
Gerrit Hi, welcome to another episode of the Standard of Truth podcast. I'm your host, Dr. Gerrit Dirkmaat, and I'm joined by my friend, Professor Richard LeDuc.
Richard Hello, Gerrit. Welcome to season four. What a ridiculous thing that we're in season four.
Gerrit It really is a good example of how if you put your mind to it and you have no talent, but someone gives you some free microphones, you can accomplish anything.
Richard It's true. Yeah, it is true.
Gerrit That's how I like to look at us.
Richard We have a lot of housekeeping items that we want to start with here. We have some exciting news as it relates to the premium content. I figured out how to provide free trials.
Gerrit So is that ability like always there and we just-
Richard It has always been there and I have never cared enough to look into it.
Gerrit I see.
Richard And we've received several very helpful emails. Thank you for those that-
Gerrit Why don't you remind me to dock your pay? You're going to take a hit in your phone.
Richard Zeroes are percent, right?
Gerrit Yeah, zeroes are percent. Yeah, that's-
Richard Well, so starting today, we will have a seven day trial on the Premium that is available to all that are interested that have an iPhone.
Gerrit Now with that, are we going to immediately rip the content away from the missionaries? You found out how to offer a free trial and so the missionaries are cut off.
Richard We have tried, I'm going to go in and try and see if I can determine how much use that's getting. We do appreciate all of the wonderful emails we get from missionaries, the scores and scores and scores of missionaries and their parents that send those in. But so we haven't figured it out on Spotify. So it is only on the Apple, the free trial is only on Apple.
Gerrit Your pro Apple agenda knows no bounds.
Richard Well, so it'll be for seven days. We hope that you sign up for it. Forget that you signed up for it and then continue to pay.
Gerrit Well, we don't want them to accidentally be signed up for it because we have no control over it.
Richard That's the whole point of free trials actually. Wow.
Gerrit I think that's probably a fourth wall you're not supposed to tell people.
Richard So the hope is you get in there and you take a look at it. When I subscribe to something, I subscribe to it, I immediately cancel it, then you got over seven days. But we hope you sign up for it and you try a couple of the different things out if you haven't already. The Joseph Smith and the Restoration, the Condemned to Repeat It, the American History Revolutionary War.
Gerrit Burgoyne's Sorrow.
Richard Burgoyne's Sorrow. Oh, boy, if that doesn't sell it, I don't know what will. And then obviously Crinkling Leaves or Holy Places from Our Past.
Gerrit Just the name Burgoyne should get people signing up.
Richard We did talk about him in the last episode of the year on the premium of the Condemned to Repeat It and how Howe left him high and dry out in Saratoga.
Gerrit Yeah, the middle of nowhere in New York.
Richard Middle of nowhere. So you can get in, you can actually just get the free trial seven days, listen to all of it in seven days and then cancel. So there'll be a good mix of those that do that and those that forget and pay for years and years and years.
Gerrit So people's estates will be calling us saying, what is this subscription?
Richard Yeah, so we will try to look at on Spotify, the vast majority of folks are iPhone users. Apologize to my wife and other Android folks out there.
Gerrit We're about to get 700 emails. Good job, Richard.
Richard Yeah, well, probably not that many. Because they are a passionate group. That is true. Open source, anyway. So that's exciting and we hope that you'll take a listen to that. There's a couple of things that we want to do this year that we don't want to necessarily commit to.
Gerrit Are any of these produce a better podcast?
Richard They produce a better overall experience.
Gerrit But none of our goals is just do better?
Richard No, no, it's gonna be the same. Same slop every week.
Gerrit Good.
Richard But there will be no change to that. But we also, one of the things that, and I think we may have mentioned this in a previous episode, but the most fun part of the podcast actually isn't anything to do with Gerrit or myself, which is obvious. It's the listeners to the podcast are hilarious, and they're wonderful. They're the best part of the entire thing, where like-minded folks that don't take themselves too seriously, but take the gospel seriously, get together and kind of give some good-nature ribbings. And so we want to try to do more things to incorporate some of the content that we receive in emails, in terms of funny lines, funny content, funny emails, some pictures and things that we receive. So we wanna try to, that's probably more after my dissertation defense, but we want-
Gerrit I feel like none of this was, I told before we hit go. Before, but Yay Richard's just like, the only way I'm gonna get this in is through trickery and deceit.
Richard Well, we have, we have mentioned, you know, fan pages and different things that could be fun.
Gerrit I have no recollection of those events. Send it in.
Richard Anyway, so we wanna do some more of those things. So with the premium stuff and better listener engagement and then obviously continued on the tours and things, that is looking forward to 2024. So it should be a lot of fun as we try to do more and more things to engage with just the greatest listeners ever.
Gerrit I thought you were gonna say, well, since it's a presidential election year, we're gonna switch to being a political podcast. Yeah. Did that, no, that one ended up on the cutting room floor.
Richard It did, yeah, we're not going to, we're not gonna do that. But we do have, to start things off, was there anything else that I missed, even though most of those things were things we never talked about?
Gerrit Yeah, you're asking me, are there things that I wanted to talk about that I never told you about, that you never read past me?
Richard Yes, any other things that I missed?
Gerrit You know what, I think maybe, no.
Richard Okay. Well, then to the Phebe Draper mailbag, we have one email here. We have dozens and dozens of emails. Well, one email that we're going to read, yes.
Gerrit Scores and scores. Again, thank everyone for sending the emails you do. They really do, they make this worth doing, honestly, getting a great email and we get a lot of them. We don't have the ability to respond to all of them or read all of them on the air, but we really do read them all.
Richard So when my son isn't being robbed in Peru.
Gerrit He's emailing the podcast.
Richard He's emailing the podcast.
Gerrit I wanted to know what are you emailing on? Cause I know it's not your cell phone.
Richard Cause that's been stolen. So, well, no, he couldn't steal it the second time. Cause it had already been stolen the first time.
Gerrit Oh, it's a good thing they didn't replace it very fast.
Richard That's true. So he's actually requested to be friend of the show, Rigdon, rather than my son. That's how he'd like to be referred. And his brother says, brother of friend of the show. That's how they'd like to be referred to.
Gerrit Andrew, you are now brother of the friend of the show.
Richard And Rigdon's friend of the show. Rigdon, thank you for your emails. They weren't good enough to read on air.
Gerrit No, we kind of answered the Christmasy one. A little bit. A little bit, a little bit.
Richard We didn't read it on air, I mean.
Gerrit No, no, why would we do that?
Richard So the subject is, revenge is a dish best served cold and stale. This comes to us from Valerie. I've been plotting this email since this summer. A short background, if you're moving to Texas, if you...
Gerrit That sounds like there would be like, ricin in it when we open it up. Yeah, it just pops out of your computer.
Richard After moving to Texas a few years ago, I was called to be a seminary teacher for our stake. Well, first of all, I mean, my goodness, thank you for your service.
Gerrit Welcome to the Celestial Kingdom. This is your sweet water river?
Richard I taught seminary for two weeks on my mission. We had to substitute in for somebody. And I thought on my mission that I wanted to be a seminary teacher. I'm like, oh, this is, what if I could just, this would be my life, would be the gospel, and this would be incredible, and I would love it, and it'd be the greatest thing ever. And then I taught it for two weeks with my companion. And then I never wanted to speak about it again.
Gerrit But then you thought, you know what, years later we'll create a podcast where all we do is talk about the gospel.
Richard It's true, without any teenagers there to give me a guff. Anyway, so yes, again, thank you for your service. For some time, I enjoyed sharing many quotes with my class that I had written into the margins of my scriptures that I used while attending religion classes at the BYU. When I started listening to your podcast and felt, I felt the need to research each quote before sharing them with the youth.
Gerrit Oh, well that's what we want. We want you to know where they're coming from, great.
Richard Well, let's see how this goes. Most, most I cannot find quoted by the source I was told in my class, or I cannot find it at all. Well, there you go. Ouch. My bubble.
Gerrit Hopefully she didn't take the class from me. I wrote down everything you said, I can't find it anywhere.
Richard My bubble was popped. And now I have to question everything that I remember from those classes. Thanks so much. When I listened to one of your episodes over the summer, you, and you talked about Utah town of Scipio and that you had chosen to believe that it was linked to the Battle of Carthage.
Gerrit Oh yes.
Richard I mentally noted in the back of my head, it could be my revenge of the dream crushers. I think I can only partially crush your dream after doing some in-depth top-notch Google research.
Gerrit Oh boy, I should say right at this point, we do know what the origin is, but we were kind of kidding. Well, I was saying what I want to believe.
Richard Well, she said that. The town was named after young lawyer Scipio Africanus Kenner, SA. Kenner, who helped the pioneers get legal title to the land. Now Mr. Kenner was named after the Roman general who defeated Hannibal in the Second Punic War, but I do take some joy in the fact that the town was not named to link it to Carthage. Insert raspberry here.
Gerrit Yeah, very, very profound.
Richard In all seriousness, I do love your podcast. I majored in history in college and have always loved it. For part of my teenage years, I lived in Northern Virginia area and was able to travel to Palmyra a few times. That location has a special place in my heart. I've asked my husband a few times to consider doing a trip out East to tour the church sites and he has shown no interest.
Gerrit How did she write no?
Richard It was all caps.
Gerrit So in all caps though. So it's not just like, he's shown no interest. He's shown no interest.
Richard That's right. But thanks to your podcast, with the sports discussions and humor, he's finally interested.
Gerrit Hey, I've got it.
Richard There we go.
Gerrit You know what? All of those sports betting lies that we've given weeks after the games were over and always wrong. It finally reached somebody.
Richard That's right. We often discuss that if we had all be in our, in the same ward in college, we would have probably been good friends with both of you. We were almost ready to pull the trigger on joining you for your Palmyra tour, but our van, which I lovingly call our tithing van, tithing is literally the only thing, keeping it running needs to be replaced since our service missionary is using it for traveling to the area for her mission. I'm working on getting her hooked on your podcast so I can send you her email. For now, I have to settle for a Christmas gift of the premium content.
Gerrit Nice.
Richard First of all, you can just get the trial and listen to it all probably for free in a week.
Gerrit Yeah, that's what you gotta do.
Richard That's what you should do, Valerie.
Gerrit Listen to us and we'll sound like chipmunks, just super speed up.
Richard Well, hopefully, actually, Valerie, Santa already brought a year's worth of premium and then she's finding out about the free trial and can't do anything about it.
Gerrit Yeah, that's why we decided to announce it after Christmas. That's right. We've known about it for weeks.
Richard Now, that is something you didn't know about.
Gerrit Well, I just found out after our last recording, though.
Richard Thank you for all that you do. I can honestly say I'm a better seminary teacher and doing a better job at prepping the youth for what they will face in the world because of the messages I listen to each week. Keep up the amazing work. Hopefully, I'll be able to join your tour in 2025. Valerie, that would be lovely if you could join in 2025. We do still have spots available for the Kirtland-Palmyra-
Gerrit Baltimore.
Richard Baltimore tour. And so we would love it if you could join us for that. There's still some open seats available there. The Missouri and Illinois tour has been oversold for some time. It's going to be Delta.
Gerrit We're going to be offering people money to leave the bus. We're going to have to nail two by fours to the side of the bus that people stand on, on the rails on the outside of it. And that's just my kids.
Richard If you wanted to go to Missouri and Illinois, but that's sold out, how about going to-
Gerrit To Palmyra.
Richard Palmyra and Kirtland and Baltimore. And it'll be a grand old time. So we hope to be able to see Valerie next year and to see a bunch more folks on the tour coming up. So anyway, Gerrit, what's- How do we kick off season four?
Gerrit Well, thank you for Valerie, honestly for teaching seminary. Seminary teachers are, they are the thin line between our youth and apostasy. So we need them and they do amazing work. So I am glad that you have at least the podcast and someone to help, although it sounds like really I just made your lesson plans more difficult.
Richard Well, I mean, if she's up there just making up quotes that never happened because it's written in the margin of description.
Gerrit They're kids, how could they possibly know?
Richard Yeah, you believed it, it helped you out.
Gerrit Exactly, just get up there and be like, that's why Joseph Smith said when he was talking to George Washington. See what happens. Yeah, see what happens. Well, so we decided that because the Come Follow Me curriculum for this year is on the Book of Mormon, that we would start off with something on the Book of Mormon, maybe something helpful to your early study of it or something you can come back to throughout your study. We're certainly not going to take a week by week basis. There are many, many, many podcasts that do a Come Follow Me curriculum.
Richard That are much, much better.
Gerrit Well, I said other podcasts. I mean, how redundant do we have to be? There are other podcasts.
Richard Well, you mean the better ones?
Gerrit Which are also better. Yeah, the ones where there is a Christmas bonus. And so we will occasionally drop in and out of that, especially when it's topics that I think we have something to add to or at least that we can at least talk about. And so I thought maybe we'd start that here with this podcast. We'd start with the first is this kind of introduction to the Book of Mormon. And so I thought, you know what we could talk about is the original introduction to the Book of Mormon. What did the Book of Mormon have as its introduction when it first was in someone's hands? And you're probably thinking, well, I'm pretty sure it's pretty similar to the introduction that is there now. Now, there was always an introduction. Only this one was called the Preface to the Book of Mormon. So, you know, many books have prefaces, but the first lines that people would have read when they opened up the book would have been from this preface.
Richard So, along those lines then, the first lines, you know, people are clamoring for lists. I think BuzzFeed is built strictly on lists.
Gerrit Yeah, well, every gospel doctrine lesson I've ever been in is built on lists.
Richard Top five lists, top 10 lists.
Gerrit What are some things we need to do to go to heaven? What are some things we shouldn't do to go to heaven?
Richard So my favorite is what are the things we should and shouldn't do on the Sabbath day? Those are always my favorite lists.
Gerrit What are some things we can do?
Richard Yeah, I love when we try an Old Testament, those things. Those are always my favorite.
Gerrit Yeah, we're always at our best when we're just slightly south of Pharisees.
Richard So we couldn't think of a creative name for this list. We had some back and forth.
Gerrit Well, I didn't get to see the list.
Richard You haven't seen the list, but in terms of the name of the list. Now it's not sponsored.
Gerrit Unfortunately. We don't have it. We have zero sponsors.
Richard Yeah, so it's, we grew up listening to Rick Dees and the Weekly Top 40.
Gerrit Rick Dees and the Weekly Top 40.
Richard So rather than Rick Dees and the Weekly Top 40, it's what about Rick Dukes, Weekly Top 40, but it's like five.
Gerrit I love the idea of having a top 40 that's only five.
Richard And Rick Dukes would be like my DJ name.
Gerrit Yeah, if we were at a quinceañera, this would be-
Richard A bar mitzvah, a bat mitzvah.
Gerrit Whatever, whatever. Any coming of age thing.
Richard Hey everybody, it's Rick Dukes. So anyway, so I have, I put together my list of top five most popular, best lines. These are my, this is my list.
Gerrit Okay.
Richard Okay, all right, I have two outside look and ends, two O-L-I's. So I have a list of five, but then I have two more that are outside.
Gerrit So you have seven.
Richard It's five with two O-L-I's.
Gerrit Wow, I feel like we should probably just become a sports talk show at this point.
Richard Seriously.
Gerrit You know what, back to politics.
Richard Okay, all right, so let me, I'm gonna read this line and you tell me what book, okay? Uh-oh. It is a truth universally acknowledged that a single man in possession of a good fortune must be in want of a wife. What do you think?
Gerrit Wow, I don't know.
Richard Pride and Prejudice.
Gerrit Pride and Prejudice.
Richard Jane Austen. It was a bright cold day in April and the clocks were striking 13.
Gerrit Well, that's 1984.
Richard There you go, okay. So 1984, if that's a well lie, I mean, this is gonna be a great top five.
Gerrit Yeah, okay. So those are the two that didn't make the list?
Richard They didn't make the list, outside look it in.
Gerrit 1984 did not make the list.
Richard It didn't. It didn't make the list because my number five is this. Peter learns that his mom is having a new baby and worse yet, she's four months along.
Gerrit I don't know that one.
Richard Super fudge, Judy Blume.
Gerrit No, I didn't read that.
Richard Okay, so that's the only book I read.
Gerrit I think Angie did read those.
Richard So, so.
Gerrit Angie's in here, we'll see if we can get her to.
Richard Of course.
Gerrit If she's shaking her head, she asks you.
Richard So the reason I have that on my top five list is because that's a book report that I just repeated for four years in elementary school. Super fudge. I would literally, I read the book once in third grade and then repeated that as a book report.
Gerrit Did Becky read Super Fudge?
Richard She did.
Gerrit Oh wow.
Richard Judy Bloom, she spits the truth.
Gerrit Okay, all right.
Richard So it's my list.
Gerrit So I've never read it.
Richard Super fudge?
Gerrit No. What were you reading in third grade? I think it was Across Five Aprils. It's a Civil War novel. Of course it was. Perfect.
Richard Okay. So now this number four, I think you'll get it in context, but somewhere in La Mancha, in a place.
Gerrit Is it Man of La Mancha?
Richard It's a place whose name I do not care to remember. A gentleman lived not long ago. Don Quixote.
Gerrit Don Quixote.
Richard So I mean 500 million copies sold, tip of the cap to Don Quixote.
Gerrit Okay. Go attack some windmills.
Richard Yeah. By the way, biggest argument my wife and I have ever been in when we were going to name the Instagram feed for, you know, we were going to post his pictures. I wanted to name it his tilting at windmills.
Gerrit Really? And what did she say?
Richard She did not. She's, it's Andrew LeDuc mission. So, you know, less creative, but what are you gonna do? Both of us.
Gerrit But you know what? The hits haven't been going up on it as much as they could have.
Richard Okay. I think you're going to get the next three. Call me Ishmael.
Gerrit Moby Dick.
Richard It's a classic.
Gerrit Now, call me Ishmael.
Richard Call me Ishmael. Um, it was the best of times. It was the worst of times.
Gerrit I so badly want to actually say it was the best of times. It was the blurst of times. What is that?
Richard What is that from?
Gerrit It's from a Simpsons episode in which, uh, I believe Mr. Byrd's hires, uh-
Richard 10,000 monkeys?
Gerrit Cause you know, you, you know, the old thing that, you know, if you put 10,000 monkeys in a room, they'll produce Shakespeare, right? You know, that people will say things like that. And so he did hire all of these monkeys. And the line that he read from one of them was, it was the best of times, it was the boarst of times. I don't even know why that's funny, but...
Richard He crinkles up the paper, throws it at the monkey and disgusts.
Gerrit Yeah, it's very, even though he has a whole line that's written in English, the fact that he has boars makes it completely terrible. That's a tale of two cities. And that is one of my faves.
Richard Yeah, absolutely. And then, and then this one in the beginning.
Gerrit The Bible?
Richard Well, it's got, so there's, there's dispute on how many copies printed, but somewhere between five billion and four trillion copies of the Bible. So a lot of folks have read it. You hear that, there you go. The top five intros according to Rick Dukes, sponsored by Jersey Mike.
Gerrit Although according to a poll that my brother sent us earlier this week.
Richard That was fascinating.
Gerrit That, you know, Christians, evangelicals, they can know their Bible all they want, but in this poll, Latter-day Saints knew their Bible better than they did.
Richard Crushed it. Yeah, that was amazing. We ought to include that poll in next week's Rick Dukes.
Gerrit We'll talk about that next week. In Rick Dukes weekly top 40, that's a poll that's only five, but also two more for some reason. OLI, outside look at it. There you go.
Richard Anyway, on to the preface.
Gerrit Now on to the countdown. The first words you would have read when you came to the preface of the Book of Mormon. So imagine you've never read it before, okay? You don't know what it is. Someone hands it to you and says, hey, this is from that gold Bible, right? This is that gold Bible. To the reader is how it opens. Very profound. As many false reports have been circulated respecting the following work, and also many unlawful measures taken by evil, designing persons to destroy me, and also the work, I would inform you that I translated by the gift and power of God and cause to be written 116 pages, the which I took from the Book of Lehi. So this is all one sentence, by the way. The 19th century, so it's just comma, comma, comma. You just keep going. What does this sound like to you when you first hear it?
Richard Sounds like Joseph Smith history a little bit.
Gerrit Doesn't it? It's very similar. When you start off with Joseph Smith history, the first opening line is telling you because there have been many false things circulated, right? And so here, this is the beginning point of the explanation of both the history of the church, but it was actually the opening point of the beginning, the first explanation of the Book of Mormon. Many false reports have been circulated respecting the following work. And unlawful measures have been taken by evil and designing persons who destroy me, and also the work, I would inform you that I translate by the gift and power of God. And I notice he says that from the very beginning. Where this comes from is from the gift and power of God, which I caused to be written from the Book of Lehi, which was an account abridged from the plates of Lehi by the hand of Mormon. Now, of course, as an early reader, you have no idea who any of these people are, right? You've got these from plates, there's a book of Lehi, I don't know who Lehi is, from the hand of Mormon.
Gerrit I guess the name of the book is Book of Mormon. Maybe that would make more sense at the time. Think about the fact that we weren't always called Mormons. Right, so the derogatory Mormon is something that derives from people believing in the Book of Mormon. So what would someone have thought when they first read that word Mormon before there was a church? If they're reading this in 1829, before there's a... If they were to read these lines right as it's going to print in March of 1830 when they're finishing it, what would they think reading that by the hand of Mormon? So some other person's involved, which set account some person or persons have stolen and kept from me, notwithstanding my utmost exertions to recover it again? So there's something else you get there. We don't hear a whole lot about what Joseph did to try to get those pages back.
Gerrit Now, of course, he's making a reference to it. I think every Latter-day Saint now knows what is often referred to as the lost 116 pages that we call the stolen 116 pages because they are not lost. They are not misplaced car keys. They are not wandering in the woods somewhere and couldn't find their breadcrumbs back to Martin Harris. They were stolen. We know they were stolen because God tells Joseph Smith they were stolen, but that's what happened, and so you can tell just how big an impact the theft of these pages has on Joseph. That while they are preparing this book for publication, he feels like the first thing a reader has to read isn't, this book is a testimony of Jesus, or let me tell you the miraculous way I found these plates.
Gerrit It's, they're going to be people that try to discredit this work who stole half part of the work from me from the very beginning. And he's going to go and give some pretty good detail on why it is what it is. Which set account some persons or persons have stolen and kept from me, notwithstanding my utmost exertions to recover it again, and being commanded of the Lord that I should not translate the same over again, for Satan had put it into their hearts to tempt the Lord, their God, by altering the words that they did read contrary from that which I had translated and caused to be written. And if I should bring forth the same words again, or in other words, if I should translate the same over again, they would publish that which they had stolen, and Satan would stir up the hearts of this generation, that they might not receive this work. But behold, the Lord said unto me, I will not suffer that Satan shall accomplish his evil design in this thing.
Gerrit Therefore, you shall translate from the plates of Nephi until you come to that which you have translated, which you have retained. So that's a very interesting part when we talk about the Lost Pages. We tend to assume that, at least I always did. It's all gone. Yeah. All of it's gone. Now, look, a considerable amount of it's clearly gone. 116 pages, whatever we're saying that is, is an enormous amount of work and time. I mean, as someone who's written 116-page papers myself, when your hard drive crashes and it's gone, that's a tough day. And that's not when you're under the condemnation of God because you violated an oath that you made to God, when it's something that's completely meaningless like any history I've ever written. But here you get this explanation that, of course, Joseph is getting from Revelation that he's going to continue to translate until he comes to that portion that he's retained.
Gerrit There must be something that he still has in his possession. There must be something that wasn't part of what was stolen. And yet, the Preface doesn't really tell us what that is. So that's something kind of a key to think about. The Lord tells him, Behold, you shall publish it as the record of Nephi, and thus will I confound those who have altered my words. I will not suffer that they shall destroy my work, yea, I will show unto them that my wisdom is greater than the cunning of the devil. Wherefore, to be obedient under the commandments of God, I have, through his grace and mercy, accomplished the thing which he hath commanded me, respecting this thing. I would also inform you that the plates of which hath been spoken were found in the township of Manchester, Ontario County, New York. And then it's signed the author. So this is an interesting preface, right?
Gerrit The first thing that people are to know going into this is that there have been people that are going to try to circulate something to destroy the work. Now, of course, that doesn't ever actually happen. One could argue it doesn't happen because the preface calls it out before it happens. I mean, maybe this is the reason why. We don't really know the reason why that the people who stole the pages didn't at least try to make some hay with it, right? Because sure, Joseph didn't retranslate the exact same thing. So, oh, I've lost my ability to say, oh, look, this word's different than that word. But couldn't I still just bring it forth and say, hey, look, here's something that's different even if it's from a different book. I mean, it's not like everybody listening is a 20th century anti-Mormon, okay? So, they wouldn't know enough to know that the books are even different. They could point out, frankly, like the people who try to point out the similarities with the late war in the Book of Mormon, people could try to point out similarities and still make an argument.
Gerrit So, I'm actually kind of surprised that nothing did come out of that. And of course, the great quest of every generation of Latter-day Saint historians is, oh, maybe someday we'll find the lost 116 pages. People write essays about what they think was in them. They write essays about who they think stole them. They try to narrow down to suspects, things like that. The reality is, we don't know what happens to those pages. The Lord gives us all kinds of information about them, that it was a conspiracy, that it's a group of people, that they were inspired by Satan, and you get all of this in this greater explanation in Doctrine and Covenants Section 10, where you hear all about this and that they're inspired by the devil to do it because they work works of unrighteousness. So it's a very clear thing, just like we've talked about before with Joseph Smith's First Vision.
Gerrit Latter-day Saints take Satan seriously. We don't play around with whether or not there's actually an evil being that exists, as many Christians in the world today do. Latter-day Saints, from their inception, from Joseph Smith's First Vision to the temptations that we talked about with Moroni, don't worry, this isn't going to be Moroni Part 7 or 8 or 9. Where were we at?
Richard Well, we were Moroni Addendum, which was really Part 6.
Gerrit Couldn't we do like multiple addenda, though?
Richard Yeah, I mean, my understanding is that Moroni did a lot of stuff. We ought to do a Moroni Part 1, but do a different Moroni.
Gerrit Captain Moroni?
Richard 100%.
Gerrit Okay.
Richard If all men had been.
Gerrit You know what? If all men had been and everyone would be. Like unto, okay. So you have the temptation we talked about in the Moroni episodes that Joseph has of Satan when he's going to first get the plates. You also have what we know of Joseph talking about how the devil appeared to him on the banks of the Susquehanna River, you know, in the guise of being an angel of light, and that Michael had to appear and detect and say, hey, that's Satan. Satan is a real being in Latter-day Saint theology. And here in the Preface, this piece of doctrine that you get is that in fact, that it is the devil that is trying to destroy this work and that God is more powerful. I will show unto them, this is the Lord speaking, that my wisdom is greater than the cunning of the devil.
Gerrit Now, of course, we could talk about the way that this is done with words of Mormon and how Mormon, I mean, it really is, it tugs on my heartstrings as a historian, because Mormon is like the first, frankly, Mormon historian. I mean, I don't know really any other way. He's the first Latter-day Saint historian.
Richard It's like calling it Lou Gehrig's disease, he's the first.
Gerrit Yeah, what are the odds? Yeah, right. And he is taking all of these records, all of these plates, scrolls, whatever he has, and he's creating a narrative taking from this source. And look, there's all kinds of quotes that he has. Oh, and then Alma said, and da, and then he provides commentary, and thus we see how foolish it made the, it's great when Mormon breaks into the like, lonely, tell you something. And of course, part of the reason why Mormon felt the need to editorialize at times is he already knew the end from the beginning. He already knew what was going to become the end of this great civilization that was built on truth and righteousness and how it would eventually become something that would be destroyed. And so, you know, I love his little interludes. Try to notice them as you're reading the Book of Mormon, that, you know, he'll be quoting, you know, this is what, you know, Helaman had to say, this is what Nephi had to say, and then all of a sudden you'll break in and they'll be like, and there were not so many that today, I know he'll give his little editorializing.
Gerrit But with Words of Mormon, it really tugs at my historian's heart. Because in Words of Mormon, he tells us that he's already written a lot of things. He's already completed an abridgment of a bunch of the record. He's already passed a certain point. And then he finds the small plates of Nephi. I don't know where they were. Like the archivist who had put the plates in the ground and misplaced them or something. Like, oh, we labeled that book of Nephi. Not Nephi. No wonder it wasn't where it was supposed to be. I don't know if his library card was out of date. We don't know why he doesn't have the small plates of Nephi at first. But imagine what it's like to have written hundreds. I mean, well, I don't know what you've written. Thousands and thousands of words, although characters, whatever. Only to find this incredible source that is the firsthand religious account of Nephi and then also his brother Jacob and then also passed down.
Gerrit And you didn't include any of it in your magnum opus. You're already done. Oh, boy. Once again, something that would have been nice to have found yesterday, basically. And so he doesn't go back and redo the whole thing. Thankfully, right? All he does is he puts those small plates with the larger plates that he's already abridged. I don't know if he pops open the three-ring binder on it and reseals the gold on it. I don't know what he does, but instead of going through and rewriting it in third person the way he did with everything else, he simply puts it in there. That's the reason why as you read the Book of Mormon, your first books will all be in first person. Now, of course, they'll be quoting some people. I mean, when they're quoting Isaiah, it's not going to be in first person. But then after that, when you get to Mosiah, everything will be third person with an omniscient narrator.
Richard I have a feeling that we're going to come back to Mosiah chapter one. That's the end of April, by the way.
Gerrit You're excited about that?
Richard I am excited about that. I did just look in the Come Follow Me. I know you've got a very exciting thing to talk about when it gets to us.
Gerrit I feel like we've talked about that before, haven't we?
Richard Yeah, we talk about like seven things. We just kind of repeat them and say it a little different. But end of April, coming back to Mosiah one.
Gerrit I feel like he said, so now we can't cancel the podcast before the end of April.
Richard That's what I'm saying.
Gerrit Actually, you know, if we did, we would notice. Yeah, yeah. A couple of missionaries. They'd be like, hey, someone turned off our free feed. But so this kind of made me think about the fact that for Joseph Smith, the bringing forth of the Book of Mormon and the reestablishment of the church from the very beginning was not just a mountain he was trying to climb against all odds of the world, right? It was already against all odds that a poorly educated, incredibly poor farm boy is going to become one of the great religious leaders of the 19th century. Even if you aren't a Latter-day Saint, and if you aren't, I always wonder, why exactly are you listening? But hey, you know what? Thank you for listening. And also, by the way, you can look up your local missionaries, and you can give them a little bit of a shout out and say, I'd like to learn more about this Book of Mormon stuff, and they would be more than willing to help you.
Gerrit That even if you're not a Latter-day Saint, Joseph Smith is an incredible figure in American religious history. The very fact that he has the impact that he does, coming from as humble origins as he does, is profound. And that story isn't just one of Joseph overcoming the difficulties of his family being poor, of his wealth never becoming something great or his education level or whatever. It's also the fact that he has to overcome a very real being that is deliberately trying to destroy him and this work. And it's from the very beginning. It's from the First Vision. When the angel is standing in his room and tells him that his name is going to be had for good and evil among all nations, and that Satan would try to tempt him from the very beginning, the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, before even a Church exists, has as a central part of its theology that there is a God and there is also a Satan that is in opposition to that God and is trying to tempt us, trying to destroy us, trying to destroy men's souls and to hurt other people.
Gerrit So I thought maybe we could read a couple of places where Joseph Smith either expands on this or reflects on the Book of Mormon.
Richard That would be awesome. So when was the Preface taken out then?
Gerrit So the Preface is no longer an essential aspect of the book as you go forward. And eventually we create the modern introduction that we have in the 20th century. But I think that since you were no longer worried people were going to bring it forward, that when you get into the 1870s, well, we don't. So the next major edition of the Book of Mormon, the 1837 edition, does have a Preface. And you're thinking, oh, what did Joseph Smith write in that Preface? Is that what you're wondering?
Richard Absolutely. Gerrit, what did Joseph Smith write?
Gerrit Well, under Preface, it's written by Parley Pratt. Ah, yes. So the 1837...
Richard Parley Pratt was like, I got this.
Gerrit Yeah, yeah, exactly. Like, well, you know, sleep was a burden to me. Eating was a burden when the night came, right? I mean, how many of you have... I'm assuming everyone listening to us has watched that, right? Yeah. They have to have. Of course. And you know, it's a great story. Parley Pratt reads the Book of Mormon all night, you know, because he's worried that that Baptist minister is gonna come get his book back. But here, when the next edition of the Book of Mormon is put out, it's published in Kirtland, and Parley Pratt is one of the publishers. And so he is going to be the one who writes the preface. So this is probably not something that you're gonna, this is probably not something you're gonna study a lot in Sunday school this year. I mean.
Richard But we're gonna talk about it on the tour nonstop when we get to Kirtland.
Gerrit Yeah, the only thing we talk about is the 1837 preface. People will be like, is this the Joseph Smith home? And they'll be like, let me tell you what Parley Pratt had to say about that. This is what the preface to the 1837 edition said. The publishers of the following volumes, having obtained a leave to issue 5,000 copies of the same from those holding the copyrights, would respectfully notice a few items for the benefit of the reader. The 1830 edition of the Book of Mormon, having some time since been distributed, the pressing calls for the same as well as the Book of Doctrine and Covenants and the vast importance attached to their contents, have induced the undersigned, that's the publishers, to seek the privilege of supplying those calls by presenting in one volume both books, in a condensed form, rendering greater convenience to elders and others who convey the same to different parts. Individuals acquainted with the book, with book printing, are aware of the numerous typographical errors which always occur in manuscript editions.
Gerrit It is only necessary to say that the whole has been carefully reexamined and compared with the original manuscripts by Elder Joseph Smith Jr. the translator of the Book of Mormon, assisted by the present printer, Brother Oliver Cowdery, who formerly wrote the greatest portion of the same as dictated by Brother Smith. Expecting, as we have reason to, that this book will be conveyed to places which circumstances will render it impossible for us to visit and be perused by thousands whose faces we may never see on this side of eternity, we cannot consistently let the opportunity pass without expressing our sincere conviction of its truth and the great and glorious purposes it must affect in the restoration of the House of Israel and the ushering in of that blessed day when the knowledge of God will cover the earth and one universal peace pervade all people.
Richard So he does address here something that is, speaking of playing the hits on anti-Mormon, now that's what I call anti-Mormonism, the changes to the Book of Mormon, all of these changes that have taken place.
Gerrit You know there's been so many changes.
Richard Here they address these changes as...
Gerrit Well, certainly there are some that are typographical errors, and then also we know that with the 1837 edition of the Book of Mormon, Joseph Smith makes changes for clarity. I mean, for instance, Joseph Smith takes out dozens of, and it came to pass.
Richard Not possible.
Gerrit Look, I get it when you're reading Second Nephi, you're thinking, no, he left... He actually added more. I'm surprised there's not a verse that isn't, and it came to pass, that it came to pass after it came to pass. I mean, but there are dozens of them, they're removed. And that's not because Joseph is saying, you know what, I know I dictated that to Oliver Cowdery, but there's no possible way that was ever on the seer stone, even though it was on it hundreds of other times, right? It's Joseph trying to employ some 19th century standards to make the manuscript more readable. And the question of prophetic utterance, what is more important, that the words are exactly the same as they were given by God or that a prophet tries to help you understand them?
Gerrit If Joseph has to determine which of those categories he falls in, he always falls in the category of trying to help people understand. So when something's ambiguous, there are some changes he makes. When you don't know whether it's talking about God or it's talking about Jesus, Joseph will make alterations to the text so that you know these are the commandments of God.
Richard Those are ones that are always highlighted. See, they changed who said this.
Gerrit Because for Joseph Smith, the point of revelations was for people to understand. This is why Brigham Young will say that he would not be upset if Joseph were to translate the Bible 40,000 times over and every time it would be different in some place because when God speaks to his people, he always speaks to them according to their current light and knowledge, their current understanding. And I don't know what would happen for Joseph to re-translate all of the Book of Mormon again. I do know, though, that it's a very weird argument to believe that the Book of Mormon is true, but to not believe the same prophet who received that translation through the power of God through revelation had the ability to receive further information.
Richard Well, the 1830 version is true. The 1837 version, that's right.
Gerrit Everything, yeah. Jesus doesn't appear anymore in the Americas. That decided it right there. I mean, it is an argument that plays upon people's lack of their own understanding of the text. They assume, well, there would never be any changes made to the text. Well, why do you assume that? Well, because there couldn't possibly be anything wrong with the text. It's the most correct book. Right. The most correct book doesn't mean a book that has no errors in it. Now, I'm not saying the Book of Mormon is riddled with errors. What I'm saying is, you know, Royal Skousen has demonstrated this with a lot of his research on what was in the original text of the Book of Mormon before. It's hard to check everything because we don't have the original manuscript. Not only do we not have the 116 pages, we don't even have most of the original manuscript. Why? Because it was destroyed. Because it was put into a cornerstone of the Nauvoo house in Nauvoo.
Richard In a swamp.
Gerrit And just so everyone knows, Nauvoo is still mostly under water, even with drainage techniques. So, yeah, wasn't a great plan then. So, we really have to have a lot of just conjecture when we're trying to say, well, what was on the original? Not what was published. Not what was in the printed manuscript. What was on the original before Cowdery copied it into the printer's manuscript, which was then taken to the printer. And there's, of course, errors and changes that are made all along the way. One of the most important ones to note is that nearly all of the punctuation in the 1830 Book of Mormon is supplied by someone who isn't even a Latter-day Saint, by John Gilbert, who's the typesetter in Granite's print shop. Most of the original Book of Mormon manuscript is just, it's a giant run-on census.
Richard So I had my own occasion of Gerrit being a dream crusher. I went through the Book of Mormon.
Gerrit Is that when we first met and became friends?
Richard Pretty much. I went through and I had the Book of Mormon in an award document. I said, I would be interested to know when the exclamation points made. Because obviously this is something that is...
Gerrit Did I really do this? Was I that big of a jerk?
Richard Well, you did it in a loving and kind way. You didn't know that I had spent all this time researching, so I was like, oh, I need to publicly apologize to Richard. No, no, I mean, it was one of these things where I'm like, wouldn't it be interesting to go through the entire Book of Mormon and anything that had an exclamation point, look at what that is, because maybe there's some additional value in something with an exclamation point, an extra woe that's in there or something, right? And I did that, and I thought it was really interesting, and then we had a conversation. I didn't tell you that I'd done all of that.
Gerrit Oh, so I was an inadvertent jerk.
Richard A hundred percent. As is usually the case for you. And you're like, yeah, no, none of that was original. Some dude put it in later, like some guy, some typesetter, not Mormon.
Gerrit I mean, eventually we do have Latter-day Saint typesetters.
Richard Sure, but even then.
Gerrit But yes, I mean, the punctuation is something that's supplied and isn't originally made. So if we make a really, I mean, I think this is important when it comes to versification too. If you've ever read the 1830 Book of Mormon, it reads like a book, it reads like a novel. I mean, it doesn't have verses, it is just pages. So sometimes people will make a really big deal about the versification. They'll say, notice how it's in a completely separate verse that it says this. Well, it's in a completely separate verse now. I mean, it wasn't a completely separate verse when it was originally given. And not that that might not have maybe prophetic utterance later in the 20th century that says, you know what, let's do that. So I think it's important to understand the history of the text so that when we're making arguments about it, we're making sound arguments that can be defended. The reality is, the Book of Mormon is true, whether there's 10,000 verses or zero verses.
Gerrit The Book of Mormon is true, whether there's I don't know how many exclamation points Richard came up with.
Richard I don't know. I gave, it was a, I went back. It was like a scene from Charlie Brown, like my head was down and I was kicking rocks back to my house.
Gerrit Well, I should have set up the five cent psychiatrist stand and tried to profit off of that. But it is, the reality is the Book of Mormon's power comes from it being this testament of Jesus. So I'm always a little bit hesitant when people attempt to focus on the way a word is written, the way it's punctuated, the way it's versified, in part because I know that many of those things are later editions, but also because we don't need some kind of kitsch, special way of thinking about the words in the Book of Mormon in order to gain a testimony of the Book of Mormon. The Book of Mormon, whether it is the 1830 edition or the 1837 or the 1879 or the 1981, is the Word of God. And as people read it with an open mind, they will feel the Holy Spirit testify to them that it's the Word of God.
Gerrit And I think that's part of what I wanted to talk a little bit about. Just going through a couple of occasions where Joseph will make reference back to the Book of Mormon. Vianna Jakes is an early convert to the church who has a huge outsized impact. We should probably do a podcast on Vianna Jakes. She's an amazing woman who comes into the church and donates an enormous amount of money to the church at a time when they are desperate for funds. She brings all of her money, donates it all to the church. Not only will she be mentioned in Revelation, she's one of the women mentioned in the Doctrine and Covenants, Joseph will correspond with her to a certain extent. In one of these letters that he writes to her, he says this, I will assure you that the Lord has respect under the offering that you made.
Gerrit He is a God that changes not, and his word cannot fail. Remember what he has said in the Book of Mormon, respecting those who should assist in bringing forth this work. So this, what a great comment that she receives, that she is one of the people that brought forth the work, and it's from this promise in the Book of Mormon. Another place where there is a reference that is made to it, the Book of Mormon, is when Joseph is taking his Hebrew school lessons, he's learning more about different aspects, and then he's going to write a letter to a newspaper editor. And he's going to try to explain what it is that we believe in that. Now, of course, the newspaper editor is not going to publish everything that Joseph sent, and it's going to really make Joseph irate, because he's going to very selectively edit what he decides to publish, right?
Gerrit Which, look, I know it's hard to believe. But back in the 19th century, there were people who worked in news media who would selectively publish things to try to make other people look bad.
Richard And now you brought it back to politics?
Gerrit Well, what? What? I had no intention of that at all. So this is what Joseph says. This is a letter that he writes to Noah Saxon, as I said. He's writing it January of 1833, and he's going to describe the Book of Mormon. The Book of Mormon is a record of the forefathers of our western tribes of Indians, having been found through the ministration of the Holy Angel, translated into our own language by the gift and power of God, after having been hit up in the earth for the last 1400 years, containing the Word of God, which was delivered unto them. By it we learn that our western tribes of Indians are descendants from that Joseph that was sold into Egypt, and that the land of America is a promised land unto them. And unto it all the tribes of Israel will come, with as many of the Gentiles as shall comply with the requisitions of the New Covenant. But the tribe of Judah will return to old Jerusalem.
Gerrit The city of Zion, spoken of by David in the 102nd Psalm, will be built upon the land of America. And the ransomed of the Lord shall return and come to it with songs of everlasting joy upon their heads. And then they will be delivered through the land. But Judah shall obtain a deliverance at Jerusalem. Notice how direct Joseph is being about the prophecy of the Jews returning to Jerusalem. Again, if you don't know the history of Zionism, of the creation of the state of Israel, the modern state of Israel, you might think, well, oh, that was of course going on the whole time. This predates what is considered modern Zionism, the idea of all of the Jews returning. Of course, there's always Jews living there. But that of the scattered millions of Jews all over the world, that huge portions of them would return, that idea doesn't take steam in Europe until the 1880s.
Gerrit Joseph is so certain of it because of the Book of Mormon that here he's telling this newspaper editor, and he repeats it twice. The other tribes, they're going to gather here, and whatever Gentiles that will listen and convert. But the tribe of Judah is going to return to Jerusalem. These are the testimonies that the Good Shepherd will put forth to his own sheep and lead them out from all nations where they have been scattered in a cloudy and dark day to Zion and to Jerusalem. Beside many more testimonies which might be brought, and now I am prepared to say by the authority of Jesus Christ that not many years shall pass away before the United States shall present such a scene of bloodshed as has not a parallel in the history of our nation. Pestilence, hail, famine and earthquake will sweep the wicked of this generation from off the face of the land to open and prepare the way for the return of the lost tribes of Israel from the North Country.
Gerrit The people of the Lord, those who have complied with the requisitions of the New Covenant, have already commenced gathering to Zion, which is in the state of Missouri. Therefore, I declare unto you the warning which the Lord has commanded me to declare to this generation, remembering that the eyes of my Maker are upon me, and that to Him I am accountable for every word I say, wishing nothing worse to my fellow men than for their eternal salvation. Therefore, fear God, give glory to Him, for the hour of judgment has come. Repent ye, repent ye, and embrace the everlasting covenant, and flee to Zion, before the overflowing scourge overtake you. So, I mean, it goes on. There's more, but he's being pretty direct. How do you really feel, Joseph, right? Joseph had the ability to be pretty direct. I thought this was an interesting thing that I share, because it... I get asked the question, frankly, more often than I care to think deeply about, which sounds like a pretty poor way to answer a question.
Gerrit But people want to have the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, and they want to have its doctrines, and they want to have its culture, and they want to have its community, but they don't want to have what they see as the messy parts that get in the way of their full-throated embracing of the Church. We actually had a friend of the show, Kristen, who has experienced that Palmyra tour, text me with a question that she had, a comment that she had, that someone had made the comment in Church about how they thought Joseph Smith was wrong about certain things, and specifically talked about polygamy. And that, well, Joseph was right about a lot of things, but he's wrong about that.
Gerrit He's wrong about this, he's wrong about that. The reality is for Latter-day Saints, we don't have a place in our theology for the buffet table of Joseph Smith revelations, where we take the ones that we love and we cast aside the ones that don't make any sense to us. This was a point that Brigham Young made very clearly after Joseph was murdered. Anyone who is saying that Joseph Smith was a fallen prophet will not have fellowship with us. I get asked sometimes, do you think we'll get to a point where we no longer talk about Joseph like he's a prophet? We can still believe this stuff. I mean, why do we have to talk about Joseph Smith so much? Well, person who's being flippant. Bill. Bill, Bill the adulterer. Why do we talk about him so much? Because literally everything we believe about God and Jesus comes from Joseph Smith.
Gerrit Everything. Now, and other modern prophets used to expand it upon what Joseph taught. But I'll tell you what, President Nelson would not say, you know where Joseph Smith was wrong about things, but I'm right. I don't think President Nelson would say that. What do you think, Richard?
Richard I don't think that he would.
Gerrit So you don't think that President Nelson would say the words, let me tell you how Joseph Smith was wrong?
Richard We actually did this on the 23rd of December. We have a special family night, and we usually read part from Joseph Smith history. This year, I asked my kids a series of questions about things that they believe about, about God, about religion, about the afterlife, about everything. And then after I listed all of, I just asked them, hey, what do you believe about this? What do you believe about this? What do you believe about this? And after the list of things, I said, all of those things came through revelations to the Prophet Joseph Smith from the Lord.
Gerrit Right.
Richard All of them.
Gerrit And you know, Kristen's question was, was, well, I mean, how do I, you know, talk to this woman? She wanted to have a conversation with her about it. And I mean, she wants to believe the other things. She wants to believe in eternal ceilings, and she wants to believe in work for the dead, and she wants to believe, you know, that we have a Heavenly Mother and all these other things that come from the Prophet Joseph, but not the ones that I don't like. Right? Of course, back in the day, the things that you didn't like were very different things. And so in the early 1830s, there is a church member in New York. This is a letter that Joseph and another church member are going to write to the church in New York about a particular church member who's there, a guy by the name of Ezra Landon. We've been informed that when these two brethren visited you previously, having authority from us to teach you the doctrine of this church and to expound the revelations to your understanding, that they learned that Brother Ezra Landon did not believe all of the revelations which had been delivered to this church by inspiration by the appointment of heaven.
Gerrit Our brother Orson Pratt, while reading The Vision, remember whenever you see the word The Vision, it's never Joseph Smith's First Vision, it's always Doctrine and Covenant, Section 76, that while reading The Vision to a certain brother, while in Brother Landon's house, was threatened of being turned out of the door except he should desist. Doctrine and Covenant, Section 76 was so radical that you have, this is not a non-member, this is a member of the church threatening to toss him out of the house if he keeps reading The Vision. They then called a council of high priests to labor with Brother Landon, who when on the point of being cut off from the church, said that he believed The Vision and he would teach it to the church. On the return of said brother from the east this fall, they learned that Brother Landon did not teach. It's hard to say. Okay, fine, I guess I totally believe it.
Richard I'm gonna throw you out. Hey, it's either this or you're out of the church. All right, I'll go.
Gerrit All right, fine, I believe it. And then they came back, and Brother Landon did not teach nor believe the vision. We have also learned from other brethren that he does not walk worthy of his high calling before the Lord and without speedy repentance and deep humility will have his office and also his membership in this church taken from him. We want you to understand, dear brethren, that the conduct of our brother has greatly grieved us and this church. We want you to understand that we hold no communion nor have no fellowship for those who do not believe the Book of Mormon. That's about as direct as you can get. I was asked not very long ago, do you think you could still believe in the things of the church but just believe that Joseph kind of did make up the Book of Mormon? I mean, he could have been inspired, but the Book of Mormon is not really an ancient record. It's not really from God. But you know what? It's helpful. I mean, couldn't you still be a believer and not believe the Book of Mormon is true?
Richard Apparently not.
Gerrit Look, of the people you can ask that question to, I'm not those people. I'm number eight on the outside looking in of Richard's list of people that you can make that claim to. Because first of all, it's a logical inconsistency, right? If you're going to claim, well, Joseph was right about everything, he was just wrong about the Book of Mormon, how did you discern that he was wrong about the Book of Mormon? What magical power do you possess? What stone have you been looking in that tells you that Joseph was wrong about the Book of Mormon? Well, I mean, it just doesn't really make sense to me. Well, that's not evidence. Not when you're talking about miracles. The fact that, well, this isn't the way that I thought translation would be. But that's not evidence. That's just you not being comfortable with it. Much like Brother Landon wasn't comfortable with the vision. But here, Joseph says specifically, we have no fellowship for those who do not believe the Book of Mormon and the revelations which God has given us in these last days.
Richard I had an interesting discussion with, I know we're running late on time here, but I had an interesting discussion this week with friend of the show Rigdon about...
Gerrit Your son.
Richard My son.
Gerrit He doesn't always set aside time to talk to every listener of the show, but for his son, he kind of does.
Richard Well, so it was on Christmas, actually. But he was talking about a Seventh Day Adventist that he's teaching and talking about how it's difficult for him to be able to talk with him about this and what scriptures he could find in the New Testament. And I pointed to him, I said, well, there's a scripture in Acts and there's a scripture in Corinthians. And I said, however, a Seventh Day Adventist reads those same scriptures and says that they mean this thing. And I said, ultimately, son, you can acknowledge that and acknowledge how also important the Sabbath day is to us. But the definitive answer on that comes from, is the Book of Mormon the Word of God? Is Joseph Smith a prophet? And if those things are true, then the Revelation and Doctrine Covenants is your answer. So even to a question like that, it still even comes to the Book of Mormon as the real central part to be able to make an argument that isn't even necessarily about Sabbath day observance.
Gerrit And to the wider point of Revelation in general, right? Because we do have revelations on Sabbath day observance from Joseph. When we say that Joseph Smith is a prophet, it doesn't mean that Joseph Smith is perfect. It means that when he receives revelations from God for the Church, that's the end of the discussion about that. And that's really hard for some people. Well, because that's not what I think. Your opposition is duly noted. But that's not definitive in any way. Let me go on, because this letter goes on in a way that I think sometimes affects the way not only that people deal with the Book of Mormon, but they deal with some of the revelations that they don't feel comfortable with or that they don't like. We are informed by our brothers that Brother Landon endeavors to excuse himself for not believing the vision, saying, this is not a revelation, but a vision.
Gerrit Now, you all know someone who splits gospel hairs the same way. President Nelson will teach something, and you'll say, well, I mean, he didn't say, Thus saith the Lord when he said it. Okay. Do you think that's the deciding factor in whether or not a prophet is speaking to the church? I mean, Joseph doesn't say, Thus saith the Lord after everything he says either. Right? I mean, it's an interesting way that people try to denigrate prophetic utterance. And they always do it, by the way, when it goes against what they already want to believe. Very interesting that when people are just trying to get down to the real heart of the matter, they're always trying to get down to the heart of the matter when what the prophets or apostles are saying are against what they already want to believe. And if the only time you're doing serious inquiry is when it just so happens to be against your own personal viewpoint, well then probably you're not desperately seeking for the truth.
Gerrit Probably you're just desperately seeking to be right in what you already believe. And that's part of becoming a disciple of Christ. You're leaving your nets and you're following. And you don't know where you're going, but you're going there because the Holy Spirit has told you that this is true. And I don't have to find out every single time. Every time President Nelson talks, I don't have to sit and have an existential crisis over whether or not it really is from God. Because I already made that decision a long time ago when the Holy Spirit told me this is God's church and that's God's prophet. Let me go back to the letter. I digress. Richard's looking at me with the I digress hand motion.
Richard This is great.
Gerrit So he's trying to say, look, the vision isn't really, it's not really a revelation, but it's a vision. That's different. Right, as if there's any real difference in that. So you're saying that it's not really from God because this is something where God opened the heavens and showed the heavens to him, including Jesus sitting on the right hand of God. That's less powerful than Joseph dictating where Parley Pratt should go on his mission. That makes, again, logical inconsistency there. We want you to understand from us that we pronounce such things the work of the devil and are calculated to ensnare the souls of saints. We plainly declare, and as men that expect to and must be judged by the searcher of all hearts, that those who do not believe all the revelations and visions given to this church, that they do not believe the Book of Mormon and consequently have no fellowship with us.
Gerrit We write plain, for we are bound to do so, and we hope that what we write may be heeded, for we write in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ by virtue of our calling in His church. I mean, they're trying to be as direct as you possibly can be. Now look, if you're someone listening who's like, well, I don't know if I really have a testimony, I'm not a testimony, I'm not a testimony, this is not a condemnation of you. If you're still seeking and trying to gain, there is a very big difference between I'm trying to find out what's true and saying definitive statements like, I know that Doctrine and Covenants, Section 132 is not really a revelation from God. How would you possibly know that? What would be the method by which you would know? Well, I just don't like it or I just don't think so. Okay, that's why God gave us a prophet, because it's not about what we like or what we think so. It's about what prophetic utterance has been given. Those are just some examples of that, but I thought also I might share one other thing that Joseph makes reference to as he's in probably one of the worst times of his life, making reference to the Book of Mormon and of course his other revelations.
Gerrit This is when he is in Liberty Jail. When he's in Liberty Jail, he is very definitely in nearly the worst time of his life. And as he is in that awful place for such a long time, part of one of the letters that he writes, he presents some words that will be very familiar to you. And I'm sure Richard, his eyes will look over at me as soon as we get to the familiar words. But he says, I beg leave to say unto you, brethren, that ignorance, superstition and bigotry, placing itself where it ought not, is oftentimes in the way of the prosperity of this church. Like the torrent of rain from the mountains that floods the most pure and crystal stream with mire and dirt and filthiness and obscures everything that was clear before it all hurls along in one general deluge.
Gerrit But time weathers tide. And notwithstanding, we are roiled in for the time being by the mire of the flood, the next surge peradventure as time rolls on may bring us to the fountain as clear as crystal and as pure as snow, while all the filthiness, flood, wood and rubbish is left and purged out by the way. How long can rolling waters remain impure? What power shall stay the heavens, as well might a man stretch forth his puny arm to stop the Missouri River in its decreed course or to turn it upstream as to hinder the Almighty from pouring down knowledge from heaven upon the heads of the Latter-day Saints? What is Boggs or his murderous party, but wimbling willows upon the shore to catch the floodwood, as well might we argue that water is not water, because the mountain torrents send down mire and rile the crystal stream, although afterwards renders it more pure than before?
Gerrit Or that fire is not fire, because it is of a quenchable nature by pouring it on the flood? As to say that our cause is down, because renegade liars, priests, thieves and murderers The murderers, who are all like, tenacious of their crafts and creeds, have poured down from their spiritual wickedness in high places, and from their strongholds of divine, a flood of dirt and mire and filthiness and vomit upon our heads. No, God forbid. Hell may pour forth its rage like a burning lava of Mount Vesuvius or of Etna, or of the most terrible of the burning mountains, and yet shall Mormonism stand. Water, fire, truth and God are all the same. Truth is Mormonism. God is the author of it. He is our shield.
Gerrit It is by him that we received our birth, and it was by his voice that we were called to a dispensation of his gospel in the beginnings of the fullness of times. It was by him we received the Book of Mormon, and it was by him that we remain unto this day, and by him we shall remain, if it shall be for our glory. And in his almighty name, we are determined to endure tribulation as good soldiers unto the end. But brethren, we shall continue to offer further reflections in our next epistle. That's just part of the letter. But you see, in the midst of Joseph talking about all of the muck and the mire that's thrown up against the church, one of the things that Joseph comes back to is that all of our truth comes from God, and the Book of Mormon comes from God.
Gerrit So as you study the Book of Mormon this year, I hope one of the things you can do is come back to it again and again and again. And not just study for where that exclamation point might be or where that verse might spell out the word Zion in a side column, but study it as if these words were coming from the mouth of Joseph Smith for the first time as he receives them through the gift and power of God, as Oliver Cowdery writes them down, as they unlock truths that have been lost from the world for well over a millennia. We have in our possession a Book that teaches us more about Jesus and gives us a conduit to knowing that Joseph Smith was a prophet that no one else has.
Gerrit So treasure it. Take those verses that you read. Think about them in your soul. Feel the Holy Spirit push you towards a reformation to just trying to be a little bit better tomorrow than you were today, and maybe a little bit better the next day after that. I have a testimony of the Book of Mormon as the Word of God. I'm grateful we get to study it this year, and I'm grateful for the people that sacrificed to bring this kingdom forth. You know, it's a pretty small sacrifice to sit in front of a microphone for an hour once a week and talk about the testimonies that we have. But women and men, by the hundreds and by the thousands, sacrificed so that we could have those words. So that we could know something about our Lord, so that we could know who we are, why we're here, and what our purpose on this earth is.
Gerrit So thank you so much for joining us and we hope you have a great 2024.
Intro Thank you for listening to the Standard of Truth podcast hosted by historian Dr. Gerrit Dirkmaat. If you know anybody that could benefit from the material in this episode, please share it with them. And for more resources, visit standardoftruth.com. Until next time.
Quote board
Make a share card from any lineNo, no, it's gonna be the same. Same slop every week.
Yeah, we're always at our best when we're just slightly south of Pharisees.
They are not misplaced car keys. They are not wandering in the woods somewhere and couldn't find their breadcrumbs back to Martin Harris. They were stolen.
Latter-day Saints take Satan seriously.
Once again, something that would have been nice to have found yesterday, basically.
If Joseph has to determine which of those categories he falls in, he always falls in the category of trying to help people understand.
The Book of Mormon is true, whether there's I don't know how many exclamation points Richard came up with.
The reality is for Latter-day Saints, we don't have a place in our theology for the buffet table of Joseph Smith revelations, where we take the ones that we love and we cast aside the ones that don't make any sense to us.
Because I already made that decision a long time ago when the Holy Spirit told me this is God's church and that's God's prophet.
Source shelf
22 sources cited on air · verses link to the scriptures, Joseph Smith’s documents to the Joseph Smith Papersother
Valerie's email to the Phebe Draper mailbag, "Revenge is a dish best served cold and stale"
Most, most I cannot find quoted by the source I was told in my class, or I cannot find it at all.
A Texas seminary teacher who couldn't find most of the quotes in her scripture margins, and who crushes the Scipio-Carthage dream.
book
Jane Austen, Pride and Prejudice (opening line)
It is a truth universally acknowledged that a single man in possession of a good fortune must be in want of a wife.
One of the two "outside looking in" lines on Richard's Rick Dukes list.
book
George Orwell, 1984 (opening line)
It was a bright cold day in April and the clocks were striking 13.
The other line that didn't make Richard's top five.
book
Judy Blume, Superfudge (opening line)
Peter learns that his mom is having a new baby and worse yet, she's four months along.
Richard's number five, the book report he repeated for four years of elementary school.
book
Miguel de Cervantes, Don Quixote (opening line)
Richard's number four.
book
Herman Melville, Moby-Dick and Charles Dickens, A Tale of Two Cities (opening lines)
Call me Ishmael.
Numbers three and two; Gerrit adds The Simpsons' "blurst of times."
scripture
Genesis 1:1
Richard's number one opening line, "in the beginning" (book identified, not cited on air).
book
Preface to the 1830 Book of Mormon
As many false reports have been circulated respecting the following work, and also many unlawful measures taken by evil, designing persons to destroy me, and also the work, I would inform you that I translated by the gift and power of God and cause to be written 116 pages
Joseph Smith's own explanation of the stolen 116 pages, the first words an 1830 reader saw.
book
1830 preface, on not retranslating
being commanded of the Lord that I should not translate the same over again, for Satan had put it into their hearts to tempt the Lord, their God, by altering the words
The Lord commands Joseph not to translate the stolen portion again.
book
1830 preface, closing
I will show unto them that my wisdom is greater than the cunning of the devil.
The Lord promises to confound those who altered his words; the preface says the plates were found in Manchester township.
revelation
D&C 10
The fuller explanation that a group inspired by Satan stole the pages.
scripture
Joseph Smith-History
Its opening about false reports sounds a lot like the preface.
scripture
Words of Mormon
Mormon finds the small plates of Nephi after finishing much of his abridgment and simply includes them.
revelation
D&C 128:20
The devil appearing on the banks of the Susquehanna as an angel of light and Michael detecting him (section identified, not cited on air).
book
Preface to the 1837 Kirtland edition of the Book of Mormon, by Parley P. Pratt and the publishers
It is only necessary to say that the whole has been carefully reexamined and compared with the original manuscripts by Elder Joseph Smith Jr. the translator of the Book of Mormon
Explains that the text was reexamined against the manuscripts by Joseph Smith and Oliver Cowdery.
sermon
Brigham Young on Joseph translating the Bible 40,000 times (source not named on air)
God speaks to people according to their current light and knowledge.
book
Royal Skousen's research on the original text of the Book of Mormon
Said on air as "Royal Scousin"; cited for reconstructing the original text.
letter
Joseph Smith to Vienna Jaques
I will assure you that the Lord has respect under the offering that you made.
Said on air as "Vianna Jakes"; Joseph assures her she is among those the Book of Mormon promised would help bring forth the work.
letter
Joseph Smith to N. C. Saxton, January 1833
The Book of Mormon is a record of the forefathers of our western tribes of Indians, having been found through the ministration of the Holy Angel
Said on air as "Noah Saxon"; the editor published only part of it, which made Joseph irate.
scripture
Psalm 102
The city of Zion, spoken of by David in the 102nd Psalm, will be built upon the land of America.
Cited in the Saxton letter for the city of Zion in America.
letter
Joseph Smith and others to the church in New York, 1833, on Ezra Landon
We want you to understand that we hold no communion nor have no fellowship for those who do not believe the Book of Mormon.
A member threatened Orson Pratt for reading The Vision; the letter says those who reject the Book of Mormon have no fellowship with the church.
letter
Joseph Smith, letter from Liberty Jail, March 1839
Hell may pour forth its rage like a burning lava of Mount Vesuvius or of Etna, or of the most terrible of the burning mountains, and yet shall Mormonism stand.
Words later familiar from scripture; Joseph declares no power can stop God pouring knowledge on the Saints.
Episode quiz
Pass to stamp your passportQuestion 1 of 8Score 0
What was the Book of Mormon's original front matter called in 1830?
Fun with Numbers
This episode, counted from its transcript1:21:50long
23.5 minbefore the topic starts
22sources read or named
6scripture passages
7different years mentioned
0dollar amounts said
From 1829 to 1984
Every year mentioned in the episode. Tap one to jump to it.
Percentages said on air
Putting numbers to words
All 13,263 words of the automatic transcript, counted against a word list for each theme. It shows how much a theme comes up, not what was said about it. See the lists
What this episode talks about more than usual
- Scripture43 mentions, 1.6 times the show’s usual rate
Names said most
Joseph counts any Joseph.
Joseph 72Jesus Christ 10Satan 10Nephi 9Moroni 8Russell M. Nelson 5
Signature words
Said often here and in few other episodes.
preface 17tribe 7mire 5fudge 4scores 5monkey 4
More from this episode
Claim checkThings people say, and what the episode shows.
Claim check
What critics say, and what the episode foundChanges to the Book of Mormon text since 1830 prove it isn't from God.
"Most correct book" means the Book of Mormon has no errors at all, down to its punctuation and verses.
You can keep the parts of Joseph Smith's revelations you like and set aside the rest.
Take it to classReady to use in a lesson or a talk.
Take it to class
Ready to copy into a lesson or a textThe first words an 1830 reader saw in the Book of Mormon were Joseph's preface about the stolen 116 pages, a reminder that Latter-day Saints take a real adversary seriously.
Words of Mormon shows a historian finding a priceless source after he'd finished his work, and including it rather than starting over.
Joseph's changes to the Book of Mormon text were made to help people understand; the Book of Mormon is true whether it has 10,000 verses or zero.
From Liberty Jail Joseph wrote that hell may pour forth its rage, "and yet shall Mormonism stand," because truth comes from God.
Banter binThe funniest moments in this episode.
Banter bin
The running jokes, for people who skip aheadFree microphones and no talentHow they made it to season four (0:52).
Richard's pro-Apple agendaThe free trial only works on iPhones; apologies to Becky and the Android folks, and 700 emails incoming (2:24, 3:53, 4:03).
Same slop every weekNone of the new-year goals involve a better podcast (4:36, 4:39).
Friend of the show RigdenRichard's son, robbed in Peru twice, asks to be called friend of the show; his brother is "brother of friend of the show" (7:23-7:54, 68:30).
The Phebe Draper mailbagValerie's revenge of the dream crushers: Scipio was named for a lawyer, not linked to Carthage (6:55, 10:20-10:39).
Sports betting liesValerie's husband is finally interested in a church history tour thanks to the sports talk (11:36-11:44).
Two-by-fours on the busThe Missouri tour is so oversold people will ride on rails outside the bus, and that's just Gerrit's kids (13:41).
Rick Dukes' Weekly Top 40 (but it's five)Richard's DJ name and his list with two "OLIs," outside looking in, sponsored by Jersey Mike's (17:39-18:40, 22:27, 23:17).
The Moroni series"This isn't going to be Moroni Part 7 or 8 or 9"; Richard suggests a Captain Moroni Part 1 (33:06-33:50).
Gerrit the dream crusherRichard's exclamation-point study dies when the punctuation turns out to be the typesetter's; he walks home like Charlie Brown (50:36-53:03).
It always comes back to politicsSelectively edited 19th-century newspapers (56:11, 56:25).
The Phebe Draper Palmer Brown MailbagSend Gerrit and Richard your question.
The Phebe Draper Palmer Brown Mailbag
Your question could be next week’s episodeQuestions from Litners drive a lot of episodes. Send yours. If it makes the show, Richard reads it on air.
General ConferenceGeneral Conference talks that cite a scripture read in this episode.
In General Conference
Talks from the latest General Conference that cite a scripture this episode reads or names on airSummaries, themes and lessons for every talk are on What Did They Say?
Go deeperWhere to read more.
Go deeper
Deep dives the episode points towardWhat Joseph did trying to recover the stolen 116 pages, and the theories about who took them (26:33, 32:00).
Vienna Jaques, the early convert who gave everything to the church and is named in the Doctrine and Covenants (54:06).
Royal Skousen's work on the original Book of Mormon text and what survived the Nauvoo House cornerstone (48:49).
Mormon's editorial asides ("and thus we see") as a historian's commentary, read through the whole Book of Mormon (35:21).
Joseph's 1833 prophecy of the Jews returning to Jerusalem compared with the rise of modern Zionism in the 1880s (57:28).
SOT Litner · S4E1.