NOM

Hey!

This is a new page after the Tower of Babel one from a week or two ago, so most of this is the same request as the Babel one.

This is meant to be a part of a larger project summarizing key biblical scholarship problems with the Book of Mormon and I think will include Adam and Eve, global flood, Tower of Babel, Deutero-Isaiah, and the long ending of Mark... probably some more once I get going and things pop up.

The second one is on Adam and Eve and is @ https://www.ldsdiscussions.com/adam

The goal is to create a larger document from these for those who want to download them all together eventually, so what I'm trying to accomplish are pages on each topic that are brief but cover the topic, the problems, the apologetic responses, and a conclusion.

Just wondering what you all think about this format... if you want to reply with comments, here are some areas I'm trying to work on as I get ready to expand into other topics

1. Is the length too long or too short to give a decent overview of the problems and apologetics? Does it have enough info to make the point effectively, or is it too short to make sense given the complexities?

2. Is the tone as neutral as possible given that I'm coming at this from a position of someone who no longer believes?

3. Is the flow helpful in the context of a larger document going through these topics (think of something like CES Letter/Letter For My Wife) once I have everything done

4. Any other thoughts you have on this page - I realize you have to take some jumps since there are biblical scholars who do believe that Adam and Eve are historical people, even though I think the overall evidence makes clear it can't be a literal event given DNA, archaeology, and the Bible itself.

Thanks in advance for any advice - this one was tougher than Babel because it's so much more intertwined in everything Joseph Smith wrote and taught and I was trying to keep it concise but it got longer than I wanted. Big thanks to Palerider for finding the Sidney Rigdon quote to show where Joseph Smith connected Adam to the 'Ancient of Days.'

Thanks

This is very well done. It was interesting to read that Joseph saw Adam.... and Michael in the same vision on Jan. 21, 1835. Fortunately my current D&C has edited out that unpleasant contradiction. I was fascinated to learn about Sidney Rigdon declaring Adam as the "Ancient of Days" before Joseph Smith. I learned new stuff, and your writing was clear enough that even a doddering 65 year old like me could make sense of it. Thanks

Your work is incredible and you know I'm a huge fan. Kinda funny, but as I was reading the intro it struck me that Mormonism claims not only a literal Garden and Adam/Eve, and a literal 6,000 year timelines - but it also literally happened in MO. Add the Jesus visit to the Americas and the literal claim of Hebrew lineage and it now sounds to me like something utterly nonsensical.

I feel like the piano player at the whorehouse who worked there until he was 44 years old before he realized what was going on upstairs.

Yobispo wrote: ↑Tue Sep 08, 2020 12:04 pm I feel like the piano player at the whorehouse who worked there until he was 44 years old before he realized what was going on upstairs.

Haha... that's a great visual!

Even as a believer I never really took Adam and Eve literally, but it still never clicked either that if Adam and Eve weren't literal, the Missouri stuff was nonsense along with all of Mormonism that builds off that literal story. Whenever I think about it I feel so stupid, but I also know we're programmed to make these things work even when we come across problems... but yeah, it's absolutely stupid to think that Adam and Eve just happened to live in America where the church just happened to settle with "alters" that survived a global flood and thousands of years unharmed.

It's so stupid - I'm starting the global flood now and it's not nearly as damaging as Adam and Eve is, but the entire Book of Abraham requires it. Just amazing that the entire premise of the Book of Abraham is that it was discovered while still underwater, and that never clicked to me as a believer and even as a nonbeliever I didn't come across it until just recently.

deacon blues wrote: ↑Mon Sep 07, 2020 3:11 pm This is very well done. It was interesting to read that Joseph saw Adam.... and Michael in the same vision on Jan. 21, 1835. Fortunately my current D&C has edited out that unpleasant contradiction. I was fascinated to learn about Sidney Rigdon declaring Adam as the "Ancient of Days" before Joseph Smith. I learned new stuff, and your writing was clear enough that even a doddering 65 year old like me could make sense of it. Thanks

Thank you!

I must say that Palerider found that Rigdon quote which I think is crucial to understanding why Joseph Smith never taught these ideas before 1835 *and* why he never made any reference to Adam when revising Daniel in 1830.

The amount of material and ideas that Joseph Smith retrofitted back into his writings is really amazing, and the apologetics that he merely just got a better understanding of his own revelations is absolutely nonsensical.