Sword of Laban

Intro 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, back off of our sojourns, and welcoming back my friend who seems to be at least angling towards being replaced, Richard LeDuc.

Richard Hello, Gerrit. Thanks for having me back.

Gerrit You keep saying that. That's why I feel like at this point, what you're trying to get replaced. Like, when I call the elders quorum president to come help me move, and I don't do that, by the way, because I've been an elders quorum president, so I don't ever call anybody. I'll haul everything out of my house myself before I call one person. People will find me dead on the road with a love sheet over the top of me with people saying, hey, hey, we would have helped before I will ever call for help. But, you know, it would be similar to, you know, the elders quorum president, you know, like getting that kind of a call. That's, I feel like you're putting that, you're floating it out there.

Richard I am floating, now we've done 260, I think this is our 264th episode in some capacity between premium and bonus and whatever the heck the free thing is. But to your point, by the way, Becky is a very private person. And her dream is that I'm dead for a month before people find out about it.

Gerrit Yeah, that is, you know what?

Richard That is a dream. I'm buried, the funeral. Yes, that I'm buried, that everything's taken care of. And then people are like, oh, I just heard Richard passed away.

Gerrit Yeah, well, they like come by and they're like, hey, was Richard still gonna play on the softball team? And she's like, oh, I'm sorry, Richard's at Park Lane. Park Lane, what's he doing over there? He's visiting some other graves. I mean, she just keeps playing it out. How long can she go?

Richard Yeah, no, my favorite is like anytime anyone's sick, she doesn't want me to tell anyone, doesn't want anyone to know. She doesn't want to be a bother to anybody. And so again, her dream is my death. And just leave it there. Just my death.

Gerrit Is your death part of the dream or just the dream that when you die, like she's not putting arsenic in your water, is she? I mean, I need to know. I mean, I know that you've irritated her at times, but has it gotten to that level?

Richard Well, if you could imagine, I mean, as irritating as I am here, imagine being married to me. I mean, the poor lady, I mean, that's her sweet water river, but...

Gerrit We get a lot of emails from people who hate us. So it is easy to understand that someone who spends more time with us could hate us more.

Richard I will say, so I've said this before and I will say it again. The emails that attack, especially attack me, are my favorite emails. They make me laugh every single time. They're absolutely hilarious. I do have, so we have, I mean, Gerrit, we've been phoning it in for the past two months of, in terms of email response. We've been just cranking out great content after great content, but...

Gerrit Now we're gonna get a lot more emails, just about that.

Richard But we have hundreds and hundreds of emails and we're very, very sorry.

Gerrit If you have emailed us and we haven't responded, you're in a special category we like to call everyone.

Richard Yes, we've read them all.

Gerrit We have.

Richard We read them all, we discuss them, we laugh at them. The ones with memes, generally making fun of me, are hilarious. The ones where I'm grabbing ChapStick and I'm stuck to a car and I'm stuck for 45 minutes and Becky has to get a crowbar out to be able to release me from the Kia that I'm stuck to. Those are great. They're all great. But we do have three emails we're gonna get to and we've also received like several emails and also questions on the tour about the Sword of Laban. And so we're going to read these emails. We're gonna see how that goes and then sort of-

Gerrit Should we let people, let's get people amped up about this. I might, I might, I might tell people where it is. See, now everybody's calling their friends.

Richard That's pretty good.

Gerrit Now they're-

Richard Did the community of Christ retain that in the sale of the Curlin Temple?

Gerrit We're just keeping the graveyard and the Sword of Laban. Those are the two things we're keeping. We're keeping the grave, the Sword of Laban and a 1923 Greed shopping stamp book because we're pretty sure we can still turn it in at Sears.

Richard So this first email comes to us from Elder Allen, who is one of the greatest missionaries in the greater Kirtland area that we had the opportunity to meet. And he took our tour through the Joseph Smith home there, just in the shadow of the Kirtland Temple. It was awesome.

Gerrit I thought you were going to say the Everlasting Hills, just like a hill, like a slight rise.

Richard Newell K. Whitney, Lloyd K. Newell, there's lots of K's.

Gerrit Yeah, yeah, Lloyd Newell. Let's just call him Lloyd Newell.

Richard So he did his last broadcast on Sunday.

Gerrit Yep. And he left the shadow of the Everlasting Hills.

Richard He's the voice of a generation. Well, so Elder Alan, I have to say that it was a great pleasure to meet with you too in historic Kirtland. I can't believe how gracious and kind you were while on the job. Please thank your wives for their thoughtful gift of Standard of Truth Tour swag. So we did go back and hook Elder Alan and his wife up with some Standard of Tour swag. It helps that you both might have outkicked the coverage in the wife department.

Gerrit Now, first of all, Elder Alan, amazing reference. As a sports gambling show, it is one of the things that we aspire to is the inside sports references. And for those of you who don't know, outkicking the coverage is a term used primarily in American football. I don't know if the Collingswood Magpies use it, maybe in Australia.

Richard It's mostly applied to Devin Hester as an example.

Gerrit Right. So when you punt the football in football, so it's fourth down, you're going to punt it, so the other team doesn't get the ball where you're at. Generally, the punter's job is to kick the ball as far as he possibly can. Now, there's some times where he's going to try to kick it inside the 20s so people can down it. But usually his job is to just boot the thing. You know, every, every single, you know, tendon in his leg needs to snap so that that ball could go 50, 60 yards down the field. And the term out kicking the coverage comes from sometimes a punter will kick the ball so far that the returner catches it. And sure, it was a really long punt, but the returner catches it with the ability to gain a full steam ahead running. So, so instead of him catching and having to dodge, you know, a flying linebacker who only plays on special teams, and he's so juiced up with the Roids, because this is his one time on the field.

Gerrit Well, I don't want to say anything about, about.

Richard Well, I don't know that he's on the Steve Casper estate is very litigious, but I'm saying he's what I think of in terms of punters.

Gerrit Not even alleged, but he was an amazing special teams player. And so, you know, generally, that's what happens as you're trying to get your gunners down there to, and they don't have guns. These are the people who are going down the field very quickly to get to the returner. They're going to try to hit him essentially at the exact same time he catches the ball. What they want most in their lives is to hit the punt returner the second he catches the ball, and then just blow him up like he's the Death Star in both Star Wars Episode IV and then Star Wars also Episode VI. That's what they're looking for. And the term out kick the coverage means the punter actually kicked it so far that the returner got under it, and the defense hasn't had time to get all the way down the field, which allows the returner to have much more ability to dodge, get up to full speed themselves, and then they can get an even better return.

Gerrit So even though the ball went 20 yards further than it should have on the punt, the return goes 30 yards back when it would have been stopped. And so Elder Allen is making a great sports reference that we, like punters who outkick the coverage, essentially saying we don't deserve our wives at all and that it's but by the grace of God. And so we agree with Elder Allen on several things, sports analogies and our wives.

Richard I love the Standard of Truth podcast. Thank you for sharing your knowledge and talents, especially the filler parts. And that's what that was, Elder Allen. That was filler there. I wanted to talk about coffin corners, also relating to punts, but there's no time. We have to move on. But what a coffin corner is, is that's when the punter, they nail it within the one or two yard line.

Gerrit And it goes out of bounds right there.

Richard Or it stops rolling or literally just goes right out. That's one of the most exciting plays in sports, the coffin corner punt. I love your faith. I love your humor. I especially love your testimonies of Joseph Smith and Jesus Christ. I hope to meet again. I might actually have to buy a couple of slots on a future tour.

Gerrit We'd love to have him. Think of how easily we'd get into those houses in Kirtland if he was with us. Hey, we're having a really hard time scheduling the Newell K. Whitney store. And he could just be like, one side.

Richard The Lloyd K. Newell store or the Newell K. Whitney store. I'm so glad that a litner, John from Missouri, put me on to you. Best of regards, Elder Allen.

Gerrit That's awesome.

Richard That's awesome. And it does allow for us to have a gratuitous mention of the tour that we did. And it was a blast. And it's difficult to describe, because it's one of those things where it's a relatively frantic pace, and you leave pretty early in the mornings, and you see a ton of stuff, and it makes for long days, but everybody is so cheery and happy, and the places we go are incredible, and the context that Gerrit provides is incredible, and this was awesome.

Gerrit We had amazing people, and they could tell what a great time our group was having. I mean, almost every place we went, we ran into people who knew about the podcast, and so they knew about the tour because they saw who we were. And talk about FOMO. I mean, these people, the jealousy was real. They had been hearing about the podcast. For whatever reason, they couldn't go, but there they were at the sites themselves. They were probably like, well, we can't go on their tour, but let's hop in the old Winnebago, and we'll go there ourselves. But the people who came on these last two tours were just incredible people. And I said as we were leaving, the last one that these tours, the best part about them is the people that are on them. Obviously, the places are holy.

Gerrit The places are special. As you're talking about the gospel, you're going to feel the spirit. But you really get this kind of microcosm insight into what the city of Zion could be like. You have people that are wealthy who the cost of the tour to them is nothing. They're still looking to demand their money back because we ended up being the tour directors. You have people that saved a really long time to be able to go. They've never gone before. You have people that come from urban areas and people that come from rural. You have people that were converts. You had people that had been lifelong members. You had people that had rock solid, you know, dug to the center of the earth testimonies and people who've been struggling a little bit because of various things that have happened in their lives. And so you have all these people from all these different backgrounds, and yet they all come together and you get this little insight of what the city of Zion is going to be like when the Lord comes again.

Gerrit That we might be different politically, we might be different socially, we are clearly raised in different experiences. Some are coming from broken homes, some are coming from homes where there was no gospel, some are adopted, some are... I mean, you have people from every type of life circumstance and they are all united, standing there on the planes there, the little floodplain there in Hons Mill, every one of them united in that moment thinking, I am so grateful for what these people did for me so that I have the gospel. And so that I think is, it's the best part of these experiences. One, to go to the place. Sure, the places are holy, the places are special.

Gerrit But going to a holy, special place with a group of other like-minded, special people is something that brings you very close to an understanding of what heaven's like.

Richard I completely agree. It was a lot of fun. And so, you know, we're going to be, are we doing that again? What do you think? Can we run it back?

Gerrit I mean, you need to ask me after I've slept for the next three or four months. Like, I need to come home and take a bunch of unison, like all of our anti-Mormon friends, and just sleep it off for a while.

Richard But we did joke about going and doing a cruise where we're in Mexico, a Mexican cruise, you know, looking for Pahoran's mother-in-law's sublet apartment, leading into archaeological excavation. But I do think...

Gerrit But we could call it cruising through the Doctrine and Covenants, where every day we get together, we talk about Doctrine and Covenants sections. And so we're doing... It's a very truncated, come follow me. We're just getting in there and going for it.

Richard Well, so I assume we're going to be doing that again. The dates will change a little bit. We've got a lot of feedback that the first part of June is tough for a lot of folks. The problem is that every day that creeps into the summer is the seventh circle of Catholic hell and heat.

Gerrit By the time you've decided... I mean, it's like, oh, you know what? July works better for me. And also, the timing may work for you. And you will think all about that timing as it's 104 degrees in Kansas City.

Richard I'll tell you what, that bus coming in on the second day from Nauvoo after 90 degrees and 300% humidity, boy, those folks, that was a good day.

Gerrit Yeah, that was the Sweetwater River for them. They were like, do I just stay in the... Oh, we're going to go see all these places where prophets and other pioneer women lived. What if I just stayed in the hotel pool?

Richard So I will say one of my favorite parts of the tour wasn't actually any of the sites, but it was kind of a fun experience. So we're at the Abraham Lincoln Museum and they brought... Gerrit was able to coordinate the Emancipation Proclamation being brought in just for us. They had it actually on display, which was pretty cool. But there was a group of Jehovah Witnesses by where the bus was loading up. And these were good old boy Jehovah Witnesses. They had trucks, they had cowboy hats. This is my kind of Jehovah Witness, first of all. And so we offered, we had some snacks and water and treats, and we offered them all kinds of stuff and tell them we were on this church history tour. And he said, well, what church stuff happened in Springfield? Well, kind of some anti-Mormon stuff a little bit.

Gerrit Yeah, there was a governor who ordered the militia to Nauvoo to drive us out of the state. I mean, other than that, Joseph Smith was put on trial here. But other than that...

Richard So I did, when I was chatting with him, right, and one of the things that Gerrit is always great at when he's talking to people of other faiths is building up the beliefs that they have that we like and respect and love. And so I took a shot trying to be my best Gerrit, and I went up to him and I said, you know, I got to tell you, Jehovah Witness Hell is my second favorite of all the hells. And they thought that was the funniest thing they'd ever heard. And then we, you know, started talking.

Gerrit Did they ask you which was your favorite hell?

Richard I said I have a bias.

Gerrit Wouldn't it be hilarious if you're like, my favorite hell is Calvinist Hell?

Richard I was going to say, Presbyterian Hell is my favorite. But I said, look, I have a bias. I think our hell is the best of the hells. But I mean, a second place by far is Jehovah Witness Hell. You guys, you guys got it going on.

Gerrit Yeah, because for those who don't know, it's because Jehovah's Witnesses don't believe that you have a spirit. Now, as I say those words, that's horrifying to you. And everyone listening is now horrified and doing everything they can to stop the Watchtower Society from coming to their house. But this is how they get around what appears to be the inequity of God, right? So God created all of us out of nothing, okay? So God created all of us out of nothing. This is standard Christian theology. And that means God creates our spirits out of nothing, okay? God creates our spirits out of nothing. But when God creates our spirits out of nothing, God already knows when God creates them, whether or not you're going to burn in hell forever. If you say that God doesn't know that, then what you're saying is God isn't all powerful. So God obviously knows at the moment that he created you, that you would burn in hell forever. So Jehovah's Witnesses actually reject the idea that you have an immortal spirit.

Gerrit What they instead claim is that God forms your body, and then he breathes, they use this biblical term, the breath of life into you. And that when you die, the breath of life goes out of you. So you don't writhe in an agony in hell in your immortal spirit. You don't exist. You cease existing. This doctrine is called annihilationism, which sounds more awesome than even the doctrine itself is. But again, you know, a Christian will attack that. How dare you say we don't have a soul? The entire point behind annihilationism is God stops being a horrible, vengeful, almost evil God. Because if you aren't righteous, you just don't exist anymore. You essentially get the wish, oh, that the rocks were to fall upon me, right? That you get it.

Gerrit You just don't exist. Now, the righteous are going to be resurrected and have the breath of life breathe back into them, and they will live forever on an earth that's been renewed as a Garden of Eden. That actually sounds pretty great. But those who are wicked, those who in their terminology don't worship Jehovah properly, well, they just don't exist anymore. So there actually isn't suffering for eternity. There's just nothing. You don't exist.

Richard That's one of the things. So after I started with the joke, they realized that I was being serious and that I did appreciate the teaching that they have as they're trying to solve this particular issue that you're describing. And I said, I love how that helps. I mean, if a person never had an opportunity to hear about Jesus or Jehovah or whatever, that they don't burn in agony for all time. And so they were like, yeah, no, that's one of the things that we really like as well. It makes God more just and more fair. And we went on to talk about all kinds of things. They're a great group of cowboys.

Gerrit They probably aren't premium subscribers or free subscribers. They won't hear this call out.

Richard They're not, but they were lovely folks and their wives were lovely and we had a grand time.

Gerrit Just a great reminder of just how many good Christians there are of all stripes. Obviously on this show, we're talking about our church's history and the theology of our church and what we believe in the revelations Joseph Smith received. But man, there are amazing people. Who have taken what light and knowledge they do have and just leaned into it. And they have said, I will live like Jesus. And it is one of the great miracles of Christianity.

Richard 50 hours of missionary service per week is what those couples do. It's incredible.

Gerrit Yeah, I'm sure they liked the snack bar.

Richard They did. We set them up. We gave them all kinds of stuff.

Gerrit You know what? This is killing two hours here. Plus, here's some jujubes.

Richard Yeah, they did reject the blood sausage, but everything else they went for.

Gerrit That is a deep cut inside Jehovah's Witness joke. No one even knows that.

Richard Well, maybe if they've seen the movie Selena. So, all right. So, I was reading Kent's email here. I found your podcast in April of this year and listened to it almost daily. It has been great. I have a son serving a mission in Tahiti. And since it is a French overseas territory, maybe your people were some of the first Catholic missionaries.

Gerrit Yeah, I mean, but how could he have given up all of that one acre that he secured? He's not giving that up. He's not giving up one acre of frozen land in the middle of Montreal. Was it in Montreal or was it in Quebec City?

Richard No, it was downtown Montreal.

Gerrit I mean, today it would be worth millions.

Richard Oh, yeah, no.

Gerrit Well, millions in Canadian dollars.

Richard Yes, yes, so I'm fairly confident that they were Catholic, but I've met my non-LDS LeDuc family, and I don't know that they're serving missions in Tahiti.

Gerrit It's possible the whole reason why they were in the New World is they were Huguenots trying to escape persecution.

Richard Jason and the Huguenots?

Gerrit No, not the Argonauts. Huguenots, they are French Calvinists who are persecuted and murdered and killed, and so many of them flee to the New World, where everyone else is a Calvinist outside of Catholic territory.

Richard So I have shared with my son each week a gem from your podcast. He has enjoyed what I have shared with him. He believes that these gems originate from me. Well, first of all, that's well done, Kent.

Gerrit Well played. I wish we could help you with your anniversary.

Richard Since he doesn't know who you guys are, I have no reason to dispel his favorable belief in his father of my knowledge of the Church and Church history.

Gerrit That's great. So they're just talking on FaceTime, and he's like, you know, I've always wanted to say this to you, son, but you know, when the Apocrypha was first excluded from English Bibles, I mean, you know what I mean? Like, and this kid on the other end is like, this is the great, how in the world does my dad know so much about the Apocrypha?

Richard You know, Elder Brown, I was reading Bell and the Dragon just recently.

Gerrit Or maybe it's something else. Maybe he's like, you know, son, I feel like the problem you have with your companion reminds me of the Arianistic controversy. You know, Arius, he had his thoughts. And the son's just like, dad, what have you been watching? What are you doing?

Richard So my request puts me at risk of not appearing as the smartest guy in the room. It's a pride thing. Could you allow my son, Elder Brown, access to the Google Drive, which I have just granted, by the way. Also, Gerrit, I grew up in Shelly, Idaho.

Gerrit Oh, no one will read this email.

Richard I was and still am a fighting russet.

Gerrit Nice.

Richard And while I live in Cottonwood Heights, Utah now, I still cheer for the russets, and I long for the return of the old Shelly Pioneer. Gerrit, I heard in the podcast how you say your last name. That is not how I remember it being pronounced growing up in Shelly. While my last name is Brown, with the passing of my father, my mother remarried and grew up as a Matthews. So Matthews, plumbing, et cetera, in Shelly was a family-run business. There we go. Well, so this is actually... I'll finish reading this, but I would like to comment on this, on Dirkmaat here. One last thing. My wife loves your podcast, but Gerrit, she does struggle with you since you and I have similar self-deprecating humor. Who knows? It could be a Shelly thing. It is true. You guys are fighting against it, right? Just constantly trying to...

Gerrit Well, look, I mean, if you can't make fun of yourself, well, then you're just not going to get very far in life. If you're growing up in a giant potato field, you know, and the most interesting thing you have to talk about is how I pronounced my last name, then yeah, you're going to need to make fun of yourself a little bit to get through the day.

Richard Her struggle comes from the fact that my wife and I have been married for 34 years and she knows my humor and my gospel knowledge well enough that it is hard for her to believe that anyone from Shelly could really be that smart.

Gerrit Well, just tell your wife she's right. If there ain't anyone from Shelly that smart. Oh, wait, I was self-deprecating. She probably would hate that.

Richard Anyway, if you could help my son out and grant him access, it would be great so that you know I'm a premium subscriber under my wife since my wife's name since I had to get her permission to subscribe from the boss. I will say, so this is one of my favorite things about Gerrit. So this story is, I will make it relatively short. It involves Gerrit and his brother, Dallin. So when I met Gerrit at the illustrious and great Utah State University, it was Gerrit Dirkmaat. It was Gerrit Dirkmaat. That's how it was pronounced, and that's how it was. And then I joke that when he became a doctor, that it became Dr. Dirkmaat.

Gerrit Yeah. Well, as opposed to what his wife thinks, that I have too much self-deprecating humor, it's the exact opposite. I leaned into it just to let everyone know how great I was.

Richard It was Dirkmaat, but Dirkmaat no more, Dirkmaat. But the real reason for the change is...

Gerrit Yeah, just the original... So my dad had, you know, grown tired of everyone having no ability to pronounce his name, because Maat is more Dutch, right? And so look, when you have a name like Dirkmaat, or Dirkmaat, nobody, nobody is going to spell it right. It doesn't matter how you pronounce it. You could pronounce it by spelling the name. And this literally happened. You know how many times I've spelled my last name and watched someone misspell it as I'm giving them every letter? A, A, T, no, no, not two T's, no, no, no, not a no. Yeah, two A's, yes, two A's, one T, no, not two A's, two T's.

Gerrit I mean, if it's like a legal document or something, it's got to be right. You're like, I need you to actually listen as I say the letters. And so I think for my dad's family, it was more important that you sounded, that it was easy to pronounce. And Dirkmaat is much easier to say, because short A sounds are much easier in the English language. We have a lot of short A sounds. Short A is easy. But my brother and I had actually talked about it even when we were kids, you know, as we learned a modicum of Dutch. Like this isn't really how it's pronounced. And so Dallin always wanted to go back to pronouncing it. He wanted the pronunciation to reflect actual more, I mean, not that we're saying it, not like we are, you know, we're not duolingling Dutch here, right? And so he moved away to Colorado and introduced himself there as Dirkmaat. He wanted to go back to the more original way.

Gerrit And so we moved there and we lived basically at his house for years. And so when we moved into the ward, everyone was already calling him Dirkmaat. So we couldn't come in and try to upset the apple cart and be like, oh, he's actually pronouncing our name wrong. So we moved to Dirkmaat. And I kind of preferred it anyway, because look, when you said Dirkmaat, people thought they knew how to spell it and didn't. When you say Dirkmaat, they know they have no idea how to spell it. They already know that they need you to spell it for them. But yeah, it's a ridiculously Dutch name. You know, you can thank all of my Dutch ancestry, which is my dad is the first person. I'm the first, you know, we're the first born in America, right? Our dad was born in another country. That's how closely removed we are. But yeah, so many people in Shelley will make that commentary.

Gerrit They'll be like, when did you start saying Mott instead of Matt?

Richard Well, but also though, Dirkmaat, I mean, that's just a more Idaho way to say it, isn't it?

Gerrit Probably. Yeah, I assume that the more country we get, Mott becomes Matt regardless. It is true that actually the short vowel sound is generally the default pronunciation in the West, right? So how do you know someone is not from the state where Las Vegas is? You know if they call it Nevada.

Richard Yeah.

Gerrit Now look, Nevada is way closer to how it would have been the pronunciation in Spanish, right? Nevada sounds, it sounds more accurate, right?

Richard But get out of here with your Nevada. Right.

Gerrit If you're in Vegas and you say, oh, you know, how long have you lived in Nevada? They're going to be like, all right, get out. I mean, it's Nevada. It's ah, ah, ah. Same thing with, I mean, you probably feel this much more strongly than I do. Oregon? What about when someone comes at you with a boy Z?

Richard Oh yeah, yeah. Yeah, no, that's...

Gerrit Like it's spelled B-O-Y-Z-E-E-E-E.

Richard And that one drives me nuts. And Oregon, I grew up about half hour from the Oregon.

Gerrit Are you there in Oregon?

Richard Yeah, Oregon. I grew up half hour from the border. It's like, get out of here. It's not Oregon.

Gerrit Yeah. Yeah, it's Boy C, not boy Z. Also, the capital of Russia and the town in Idaho, quite different pronunciations.

Richard Moscow and Moscow, very different.

Gerrit Yeah, Moscow, Moscow. If you say Moscow, Idaho, people there are, they're looking for a fight. They're usually drunk anyway. So, I mean, they're already looking for a fight.

Richard Yeah, they absolutely are. Go Vandals. So, this Hooked on Phonics portion of the Standard of Truth podcast is brought to you by Jersey Mikes. So, we have one more email before Sword of Laban. This email comes to us from Mason. My dad and I are fans of the podcast, and we have learned some cool facts while listening to your podcast. My favorite episode was the Mercy Fielding episode. That one actually was awesome.

Gerrit That's your favorite one.

Richard Yeah, that one is awesome.

Gerrit I like Mason. Mason is my friend.

Richard She just seems so valiant and faithful. I really liked her life story. We had a church history question come up while our family was out in Palmyra the other week. Not on our tour.

Gerrit Yeah.

Richard So that hurt Mason.

Gerrit Yeah.

Richard So that hurt Mason.

Gerrit Thanks, Mason. Thanks for just giving us the shaft. We look for advertising to people that they can go to the sacred sites, not with us.

Richard No one on this, no one that listens to this podcast knew that it was possible to go unless they came with us. And so now they know Mason. Thanks a lot.

Gerrit Yeah. I have a feeling that Kent's wife isn't happy with our conversation right now.

Richard I'm so sorry, Kent's wife. We had a church history question on the tour in Palmyra the other week. We learned that Alvin Smith was engaged before he died. Do we know what happened to his fiancee after he died? Anyway, thanks for sharing the interesting content in all your episodes, even though it can take 30 minutes until you guys actually talk about church. Which is funny because we're at 36 minutes here.

Gerrit We've talked a lot about theology, and we've talked about a lot of things. See, people don't give us credit for the things we answer that aren't. Mason didn't know what outkick the coverage meant.

Richard No, he needed to know. And it's important that he did. But one thing, actually, a joke that Elder Allen gave that we read an email earlier is that he says, we do a better job cramming 45 minutes into four hours than anyone he's ever heard.

Gerrit That's a real compliment.

Richard That's hilarious.

Gerrit Elder Allen, he took us through the Joseph Smith home, which I had never been able to go through because it's a newly opened church site there in Kirtland. Not one we acquired from the Community of Christ in this last purchase, one that we've been restoring for quite some time.

Richard So before you get to Mason's question on Alvin's fiance, what was your thought and experience going through the Kirtland Temple a gazillion times? What was your thought going through this time now with the change in ownership?

Gerrit I mean, it was awesome. I mean, it was always a holy and a special place. It always was. And like all sites, your experience in some regard depended upon who was taking you through it. And that was really the case with the Community of Christ when they owned it, because you would either have someone who was married there taking you through it, and he reverenced it and loved that building more than anything in the world, or you would sometimes have an intern from Lamoni College taking you through who wasn't even a member of the Community of Christ who was just like, this is what I do to get my credit. Anyway, they had like stuff over here. You could like maybe go over to where those pulpits are and stuff. Let's head back downstairs. I mean, so I'm being a little bit facetious, but your experience greatly varied. And there was always that little bit of, you know, you could feel with the people you were with that reservation.

Gerrit Like every one of them desperately wanted to ask, why aren't you a member of our church? And of course, I've prepped them all. Like, please be respectful. Please, please don't ask them why they belong to an apostate group. Let's not do that in their temple. And so now that the temple is back, I feel like people are much more, they feel more at ease maybe there. And so I think the spirit's a little more unrestrained because they feel that more.

Richard So that's exactly how I felt. I haven't been through as many times as you, but I've been through five or six times. And no matter how nice the person was, no matter how whatever it was, I always felt a little bit like I was walking on eggshells because I didn't want to say anything to offend. And I was trying to be respectful. And now that it's in the church's ownership, and now you don't have to be respectful anymore. I don't be respectful at all. And I'm like, Hey, so who is Elias? Tell me exactly who that is. I want to know.

Gerrit Now go.

Richard But it was, I will say too, it was pretty cool. The things that they're talking about in there. It was very different.

Gerrit The focus was much more on the experiences that were there rather than the history of the building itself.

Richard Yep. Anyway, sorry. Alvin's fiance.

Gerrit So, you know, part of the reason why, Mason, you don't have an answer to this question, is there isn't an answer to the question. No one ever actually says who Alvin was, you know, engaged to be married to. Now, the person who primarily gives us all this information is of course Lucy Smith. And in her book, both versions of it, she simply says that Alvin was engaged to be married. As she's talking about just how horrible the death of Alvin is. So we don't, it's one of those things that we don't really know. Who was this woman who was already willing to take a chance on, you know, some, the Smiths who were not well off, and now there were rumors of some gold Bible delusion, we don't really know. So I wish I could give you a better answer, Mason, but I don't have one.

Richard Well, we lead podcasts in non-satisfying answers, and I feel like we're...

Gerrit I think at this point we lead an unsatisfying podcast. We had a lot of emails we wanted to cover, and, you know, we have been gone for a while.

Richard We have, we have. A lot of things have happened. Gerrit, Sword of Laban, where is it at? Where can we find it and why do we not have it right now?

Gerrit Can I go look at it right now in the Church History Library? Is it hanging in the museum? You know, this is... You know, the reason why I decided we'd answer this question is this is actually one of the more common questions that you get when people find out that you have been a church historian, that you worked on the Joseph Smith Papers, especially if they find out that you've talked about, written a couple of books on the translation of the Book of Mormon, people are fascinated with the Sword of Laban. They're fascinated with it. And part of that is how much it's referenced in the Book of Mormon. So first of all, why do people even know about the Sword of Laban? Because it's all over the Book of Mormon, right? It is, you know, first of all, you know, everyone's first favorite story to explain to an investigator is Nephi using the Sword of Laban in chopping Laban's head off, right?

Gerrit And then having to explain that God had commanded him to do that. But then Nephi takes that sword and he makes other swords as a comparison of it. And then the Sword of Laban is passed down or apparently passed down among the various prophets in the Book of Mormon. So the Sword of Laban has this kind of outsized place in part because it's referenced over and over and over and over again. So the question, the assumption is, well, the same person who has. Hit up the gold plates and also hit up the breastplate and the interpreters clearly also hit up the Sword of Laban. Joseph must have had it. What did Joseph do with it?

Gerrit We all have a pretty good idea of what Joseph does with the plates, or at least most people seem to know that. But it's a bigger question about the Sword of Laban. So let's go to what Joseph Smith actually says in the published history. So if you go to the Pearl of Great Price and go to Joseph Smith history, this is the excerpt of the history of the church that Joseph was working on in his life. This is where the most famous account of the First Vision comes from. We can see what it is that Joseph said when he was making this, he knew when he was making this account that it was going to be a public account. The whole purpose of this was to explain the history of the church and to help dispel the lies and rumors that are out there.

Gerrit When the angel appears, this is in verse 42, he says that when the time that should be obtained, when he was supposed to get the plates, was not yet fulfilled, I should not show them to any person, neither the breastplate with the Urim and Thummim, only to those whom I should be commanded to show them. If I should, if I did, I should be destroyed. While he was conversing with me about the plates, the vision was open to my mind, and I could see the place where the plates were deposited. And that's so clearly and distinctly that I knew the place again when I visited it. So first of all, when the angel tells him what he's going to find, the injunction that Joseph receives is, you are going to not show the plates or the breastplate or the Urim and Thummim to anyone. That's what the injunction is.

Gerrit So already, what we're getting from this part of the story is, if there is other things such as the liahona or the Sword of Laban in that box, well, why are those things not part of the injunction that Joseph has just received? You skip down to 51, he talks about going to the place where the box is. The stone was thick, rounding in the middle and the upper side, the thinner towards the edges. Having removed the earth is verse 52, I obtained a lever or a lever depending on where you live and how you like to describe the crowbar that Richard had to use to get his hand out of the rental car seat because he was stuck with the monkey trap trying to get his chapstick out. And how chapped were your lips, Richard?

Richard That's actually the saddest part of the story, is as my hand is trapped and I am on a conference call bending all the way down trapped underneath my seat, my lips felt like I was out in the Sahara desert.

Gerrit You felt like the rich man and the rich man Lazarus. You just needed Lazarus to dip his finger in water and cool your lips.

Richard I was going to say Lawrence of Arabia, but similarly, it was just so chapped and it was so bad. It was probably one of the darkest days of my life.

Gerrit Well, he obtains a lever, and I got it fixed under the edge of the stone with a little exertion, raised it up, and I looked in, and there indeed did I behold the plates, the Urim and Thummim and the breastplate, as stated by the messenger. So in Joseph's actual account of opening the box, he doesn't ever talk about the Sword of Laban. The angel told him, hey, there's going to be three things in there that you're not allowed to show anybody, and when Joseph opened the box, what were the three things in there? The same three things that the angel told him not to show anybody. So that kind of begs the question, right? Well, if it's not there, how does it make its way into our lexicon the way that it does? Because it's not just, I mean, I mean, you know, Teancum has some pretty cool times in the Book of Mormon, but people aren't always asking me what happened to Teancum, you know?

Gerrit I mean, why is the Sword of Laban seen as this relic that could still exist, that is still around? If you look at the other histories that Joseph Smith creates, all of them talk about this, the finding of the plates in a very similar way, but none of them are going to talk about the finding of the Sword of Laban. In fact, if you go to Joseph Smith's other, first of all, his 1832 account doesn't even talk, it doesn't talk about the breastplate at all, just talks about the fact that there are plates, and then unrelated to it says the Lord had prepared spectacles for to read the book, but doesn't actually specifically say that those spectacles were found in the box with the plates. But in his other public history, the one that was published, the one that was intended to be published, the one that's found in the Wentworth letter, Joseph provides a pretty clear description of the box, how it was formed and the plates.

Gerrit He says, you know, the volume was something near six inches in thickness, a part of which was sealed. The characters on the unsealed part were small and beautifully engraved. The whole book exhibited many marks of antiquity in its construction. I almost said consecration. I'm sure that Mormon was doing some consecration by making it, but in its construction and much skill in the art of engraving. With the records was found a curious instrument, which the ancients called Urim and Thummim, which consisted of two transparent stones set in the rim of a bow fastened to a breastplate. Through the medium of the Urim and Thummim, I translated the record by the gift and power of God. So there you actually get a little bit of an explanation of why the breastplate might not be mentioned all of the time, because at least here Joseph is saying that the Urim and Thummim, the device itself is also considered part of the breastplate.

Gerrit When I say Urim and Thummim, I mean all of it. The two transparent stones set in the rim of the bow and fasten to a breastplate. So again, he mentions those three objects, but not the others. So then again, how in the world does it get into our lexicon this discussion of the Sword of Laban? Why am I being asked everywhere I go? I mean, people are meeting me, hey, are you Gerrit Dirkmaat who has that podcast? Yes. Oh, I hate that podcast.

Richard Well, yeah, you would assume they listen if they hate it.

Gerrit Well, they've listened to it at least once. That's what we're going for, is we need everybody to download it at least once and then hate it and then never listen again, much like this podcast you're listening to now. Where it comes from is actually Doctrine and Covenants, Section 17, that it really makes its way into our understanding. So this is the section that is given, it's given to Joseph, speaking to Oliver Cowdery, David Whitmer and Martin Harris, explaining what it is they're going to see. Behold, I say unto you, that you must rely upon my word, which if you do with a full purpose of heart, you shall have a view of the plates and also of the breastplate, the Sword of Laban, the Urim and Thummim, which were given to the brother of Gerrit upon the Mount when he talked with the Lord face to face, and the miraculous directors, which were given to Lehi while in the wilderness on the borders of the Red Sea.

Gerrit So that's verse one of Doctrine and Covenants section 17. And so the witnesses, part of their witnessing is to see all of these other artifacts, not just the plates. Now, the Eight Witnesses that, you know, Joseph shows them the plates and they heft and they know for assurity, but the fact that they saw the Sword of Laban isn't part of the testimony of the Three Witnesses. So you have D&C 17 saying they will see those things, but then you drop into the testimony of the Three Witnesses in the Book of Mormon. This is what they say. Be it known in all nations, kindreds and tongues, you know, I'll skip down a little bit. We have seen the plates which contain the record, which is a record of the plates of Nephi and also of the Lamanites as brethren and also the people of Jared, which came from the tower which hath been spoken. And we know that they have been translated by the gift and power of God, for his voice hath declared it unto us, wherefore we know of a surety that the work is true.

Gerrit We also testify that we have seen the engravings which are on the plates and they have been shown unto us by the power of God and not of man. And we declare with words of soberness that an angel of God came down from heaven and he brought and laid before our eyes that we beheld and saw the plates and the engravings thereon. And we know that it is by the grace of God the Father and our Lord Jesus Christ that we beheld and bear record of these things are true. And it is marvelous in our eyes. So this is a powerful, powerful, collective, miraculous experience where the angel is showing them. But at the same time, you'll notice that that they don't even mention seeing the breastplate or the interpreters. They do mention that the plates were interpreted. So there's that. But they don't specifically mention that they've seen the interpreters.

Gerrit It's David Whitmer who's going to provide us our most extensive accounts of what he sees when he has this experience, in part because David Whitmer leaves so many accounts. David Whitmer is clearly, he lives the longest, right? So he's able to give all of the accounts that he gives, and he publishes many of them. And so because of that, we have many more sources that relate to David Whitmer. And he is going to specifically state in one of the interviews that he has exactly how this appearance took place. In June 1829, I saw the angel by the power of God. Joseph, Oliver and I were alone, and a light from heaven shone round us, and solemnity pervaded our minds. The angel appeared in the light, as near as that young man, within five or six feet.

Gerrit He's probably pointing to someone in the room there. Between us and the angel, there appeared a table, and there lay upon it the Sword of Laban, the Ball of Directors, the Record and the Interpreters. So you can tell the Ball of Directors is how he's phrasing the liahona. The Record is how he's phrasing the gold plates themselves. The Interpreters, the Urim and Thummim. But the first thing he says is that there lay upon it the Sword of Laban. The angel took the Record and turned the leaves and showed it to us by the power of God. They were taken away by the angel to a cave, which we saw by the power of God while we were yet in the Spirit. So there's more to this vision that he's saying that when the angel leaves with the stuff, that they see in vision a cave where the angel is keeping these things.

Gerrit My testimony in the Book of Mormon is true. I can't deviate from it. Anyway, he goes on to talk about how he has the printer's manuscript and that he knows that it's true. So he tells the story of, I always joke around, it's the most Mormon thing in the history of ever that before Moroni shows them everything, he first pulls a table out and sets up a table because that's what you do. You probably got it out from under the stage and then set it up.

Richard My guess is Moroni probably bonked his head as he was coming out like all of this up. He's like, dog, got it.

Gerrit And he was probably thinking, why don't we just have the round tables that we can roll out here?

Richard We can roll them out here, but you got me going underneath the stage to pull these tables out. And his wife, she knitted him something nice as a tablecloth to put over the top, and he's got some pictures. You know, it's perfect.

Gerrit Well, so the fact that the Sword of Laban is something that is being talked about is clearly in evidence by what John Whitmer will tell us, so David Whitmer's brother, about what he finds when he finds the Kirtland crazies there in Kirtland when he goes to Kirtland. He talks about how people are having spiritual manifestations. So remember, in the early days in Kirtland, Sidney Rigdon is the leader of their community, and so is Edward Partridge. Both of them leave to go meet Joseph, and all of the missionaries themselves leave to go preach to the Native Americans. And so in the interim, you have a couple of months where you have a bunch of people who have been ordained to the Melchizedek Priesthood. They are elders, and no one directing the locality of the church at all, which is why Joseph feels inspired to send John Whitmer there. And he shows up in early 1831 and says, these people are straight crazy. This is when they're feeling the spirit, they're sliding along the floor like a serpent, calling it sailing in a vessel, preaching to the Lamanites to preach the gospel, right?

Gerrit And one of the things that John Whitmer particularly says is that they would feel the spirit and act like they had the Sword of Laban and wield it around as if they were a soldier. I mean, these would have been the greatest testimony meetings ever, but also not what you would say is orthodox. So clearly the Sword of Laban has captured the imagination of some of these early members even before Doctrine and Covenant Section 17 is ever published to any of them. So no doubt the witnesses are talking about it, as well as the fact that they saw it there on that table, as well as the Book of Mormon itself referencing the Sword of Laban. So it's a very natural thing for people to assume Joseph Smith got all of the artifacts that the witnesses saw that D&C 17 references, even though all of our accounts of what Joseph got from the box are just the plates, the breastplate, and the interpreter stones.

Gerrit Not the Liahona and not the Sword of Laban. Now people, of course, said, well, I assume that he had those two. Is it possible that he had them? Sure. Is there a source that says that he had them? Not really. There is a source of someone else who says that they saw the Sword of Laban, and that is, you know, from Joseph Smith's sister, Catherine Smith Salisbury. Many, many, many years later, after all of this, in 1886, she's going to say that after Joseph had the vision, quote, he went frequently to the hill and upon returning, he would tell us, I have seen the records, also the brass plates and the Sword of Laban with the breastplate and the interpreters.

Gerrit So she includes this as well. She includes that Joseph said that he's seen all of them. Of course, part of the problem with that is Joseph himself doesn't say that he sees them when he goes to the hill. And second of all, Joseph, of course, does see the Sword of Laban when he has the same three witness experience that all the witnesses do. And that's not even counting whether or not Joseph sees it in vision as well. With Catherine Salisbury remembering, you know, this conversation, which would have had to have been at least 60 years earlier, with many other iterations of the Sword of Laban in between that time, the fact that she says that he's seen them, you know, is probably not definitive proof that he had them. Now, of course, I know this is a little bit long.

Gerrit You're thinking, you know what, Gerrit, we got to shut it down. But I don't think we can get a second part out of this, or at least not without people being more mad than they already are. So we're going to give the people what they want and talk about the fact that the other reason why the Sword of Laban holds this kind of mythic place in our history is because of something that Brigham Young will teach that you'll hear oft repeated. And that is, Brigham Young is going to explain, this is a sermon that's in the Journal of Discourses, that there's another vision that's had surrounding the plates. This is what he says, I could relate many very singular circumstances. I lived right in the country where the plates were found from which the Book of Mormon was translated. And I know a great many things pertaining to that country.

Gerrit I believe I will take the liberty to tell you of another circumstance that will be as marvelous as anything can be. This is an incident in the life of Oliver Cowdery, but he did not take the liberty of telling such things in the meeting as. I take. I tell you things to you and I have a motive for doing so. I want to carry them to the ears of my brethren and sisters and also to the children that they may grow to an understanding of some of the things that seem to be entirely hidden from the human family. Oliver Cowdery went with the Prophet Joseph when he deposited these plates. Joseph did not translate all the plates. There was a portion of them sealed, which you can learn from the Book of Doctrine and Covenants. When Joseph got the plates, the angel instructed him to carry them back to the hill, Cumorah, which he did.

Gerrit Oliver says that when Joseph and Oliver went there, the hill opened and they walked into a cave in which there was a large and spacious room. He says he did not think at the time whether they had the light of the sun or artificial light, but that it was just as light as day. They laid the plates on a table. I'm guessing this is the stage that Moroni got the table out from. They laid the plates on a table. It was a large table that stood in the room. Under this table, there was a pile of plates as much as two feet high. And there were altogether in this room more plates than probably many wagon loads. They were piled up in the corners and along the walls. The first time they went there, the Sword of Laban hung upon the wall. But when they went again, it had been taken down and laid upon the table across the gold plates.

Gerrit It was unsheathed, and on it was written the word, so on the sword itself. This sword will never be sheathed again until the kingdoms of this world become the kingdom of our God and His Christ. I will tell you this is coming not only from Oliver Cowdery, but others who are familiar with it and who understood it just as well as we understand coming to this meeting, enjoying the day, and by and by, we separate and go away, forgetting most of what is said, but remembering some things. I think that Brigham Young quote should probably be the moniker of the podcast, right? Forgetting most of what was said, but remembering a couple of things. I mean, maybe. Maybe if you get around to it. So of course, this has led many people to say, well, so that means if we were to dig through the Hill Kimura, we'd find this room with all the plates in it. I think there's several elements of that that already suggest that this is something that is seen in vision, right?

Gerrit That not knowing whether the lighting is real or not. And perhaps, look, I mean, look, we're talking about the power of God. If God wants to have all of the plates that have ever been made appear in a cave that God creates in the base of the Hill Kimura, God can do whatever God wants. You know, people who've searched the Hill Kimura over with metal detectors have not been able to locate that cave. But whether it's in vision or not, that's the other place the Sword of Laban really gets into Latter-day Saint Lexicon. Because they know that Brigham Young talks about Oliver Cowdery having said they saw it laying across this table when they have this vision of the angel again. So where is the Sword of Laban? I don't know that Joseph Smith ever even possessed it.

Gerrit I know he saw it, and I know that the Three Witnesses all saw it, which means Joseph had two separate experiences in which the angel brought the table and he saw it because he had the one with Oliver Cowdery and with David Whitmer, and then he had the other separate experience with Martin Harris. And then on top of that, he apparently had this other visionary experience with Oliver Cowdery, where either it was in the actual hill or a vision of the hill, or in some way when Joseph delivered up the plates, they saw the Sword of Laban again. So my assumption is that the sword that was never really in Joseph's possession in the first place is still in the possession of the angel Moroni, who is the one who brought it to show them it in the first place. Why? Why even show the Sword of Laban if you're not going to have it?

Gerrit I mean, that's a great question, right? What is the great question surrounding the Book of Mormon from believers today? Whether or not the Book of Mormon is a historic book? And I don't mean historic in how many times it's been published and how many people have read it or how many times I've fallen asleep with I, Nephi, haven't been born of goodly parents. I mean, does it contain, as Joseph declared it contain, a history of real people who actually lived upon the American continent, somewhere in the Western Hemisphere? There are many people who believe in the Book of Mormon who no longer believe that it is an actual record of actual people. This is a pretty standard belief among members of the community of Christ who love the Book of Mormon, who see the Book of Mormon as the Word of God, who absolutely revere the Book of Mormon, but also don't think that it actually happened.

Gerrit Now, instantly, you're a Latter-day Saint, your reflexes are already, you're yelling at the car stereo, which apparently always shows me and Richard as an alternative rock band when it's being shown up in the car. Know that what do you mean that they don't believe? Well, this is how they would say it. The greatest lessons ever taught by the Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, many of them are not actual experiences that happened. The Good Samaritan is the most well known story that there is. It's so well known that there is a Good Samaritan law, that people know that a Good Samaritan, someone who doesn't believe in Jesus at all, knows that a Good Samaritan is someone who helps someone that they don't need to help. That's how powerful that story that Jesus told is.

Gerrit It is so life altering that it's made its way into secular discourse. An atheist might call someone a Good Samaritan. But that's a parable that Jesus gives. It's not an actual Samaritan, or an actual person who was beaten up, or an actual Levite, or an actual member of the priestly class passing by. And so someone who would make this argument would say, the Book of Mormon doesn't have to be historically true for it to change my life. It's an inspired text that teaches me about Jesus, even if there never were any Lamanites or Nephites. It's a giant parable that teaches me about Jesus. Now, I appreciate the fact that they still believe the Book of Mormon is the word of God. So let me give them that.

Gerrit That's great. If that's what you have to do to believe that the Book of Mormon is the word of God, great. But that's not what we believe about the gold plates and the Book of Mormon. Joseph declared, and we declare, and the book declares, that this is not a parable. These are not just stories invented to teach us something about Jesus. These are not Aesop's fables, okay? These are real people who made real records, who really suffered, who really died, who really had Jesus appear to them. It is another testament of Jesus Christ, because those people really saw him, and they came forward and they pressed their hands into the palms of his hands, and they felt his side, and they knew for assurity that Jesus was resurrected, that Jesus was the Lord.

Gerrit So to me, the Sword of Laban and the Liahona, shown as they were by the angel, are a demonstration of the historicity of the gold plates and the people that made that sword. If there is no Laban because there was no Nephi, if the Book of Mormon is just one giant parable given by inspiration through the power of God, then where does the sword come from? I mean, you might just as well ask the question of where do the plates come from? But you can get around that by saying, well, that's the medium whereby God decided to deliver it to Joseph. But the sword is a demonstration of the historicity. It's a demonstration that these people really lived. Now you can get hung up real quick trying to figure out just what part of the Baja Peninsula or Guatemala or the Florida Panhandle or the narrow neck of land by Sault Ste.

Gerrit Marie that the whole Book of Mormon actually took place in. And we've talked on this podcast before about how the church specifically tells you to not get hung up on it. The church has a statement saying don't get hung up on it. And yet, there we are saying, you know what? I'm pretty sure I found Pahoran's Mother-in-law's subletted apartment somewhere in Belize. The Book of Mormon is true. The people who lived in it are true. The witness accounts, both 8 and 3, are a demonstration that these people are true. The fact that Moroni exists at all as a resurrected being is a demonstration that it's true and that these people really lived. And the fact that we can't pinpoint exactly where they are, even though a grand total of 1% of all archaeological sites have been excavated, it shouldn't be something that rocks our testimony.

Gerrit We have the power of God to witness to us. And I think that is part of the reason why the Sword of Laban is shown. It is shown as a witness that these things are real. Some things might be visionary, but the Nephites and the Lamanites existed. Some things might be visionary, but Jesus really did appear and really did bless those children. So thank you so much for joining us. I know we went a little bit long, but I don't want anyone to be upset saying that we didn't cover any history. They're still going to be upset, right, Richard?

Richard Oh, yeah. No, this was terrible. But you brought it home at the end. I thought that was great.

Gerrit Well, we'll see. We're waiting for the hate mail to roll in. We can get at least as much as people gave us when Richard didn't know Johnny Horton from the Premium podcast. That's what I'm looking for.

Richard The only thing we've ever received more than missionary emails, which the vast majority of emails now are missionary emails, is the Johnny Horton. I had no idea. I'm so sorry.

Gerrit I have a cowboy friend from Delta who not only didn't just email, he called and left a message on my phone asking when I was going to get a new sidekick because you didn't know Johnny Horton's song. You touched a raw nerve with them. But if you want to find out more about that, you're going to have to subscribe to the premium content. Thanks so much for listening.

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.

Chapters

Transcript

Quote board

Source shelf

Lucy Mack Smith's history (both versions)

1 Nephi 4 (Nephi and the Sword of Laban; identified, not cited on air)

Joseph Smith–History 1:42

Joseph Smith–History 1:51-52

Joseph Smith's 1832 history

Wentworth Letter (1842)

D&C 17:1

The Testimony of Three Witnesses (Book of Mormon)

David Whitmer interview on the witnesses' vision

John Whitmer's history, on Kirtland in early 1831

Catherine Smith Salisbury, 1886 statement

Brigham Young, sermon in the Journal of Discourses, on Oliver Cowdery and the cave in the Hill Cumorah

Luke 10 (parable of the Good Samaritan; identified, not cited on air)

Episode quiz

What sports term did Elder Allen use to describe the hosts' wives?

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From 1829 to 1923

Percentages said on air

Putting numbers to words

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