Paul Osborne

It was Moroni who first appeared to the boy prophet, Joseph Smith. That is the testimony given in our scriptures which has been given to the Church and was ratified by the voice of the Church.God sent an angel who lived in BofM times to a young 14 year old boy who later told his story to the world. Was it Nephi or was it Moroni?? Which? It was one of those guys in the BofM. Hmmm. Oh yeah, it was MORONI! Aaaahh. :) Joseph Smith saw many angels in the course of his ministry. There is nothing you can do or say to undo that. History is in the past just as is the light of a star you see at night. Paul O

Cal, Moroni may be a figment of your imagination but he was not to Joseph Smith and the Three Witnesses who swore by God that they saw the angel and the gold plates. There is nothing the world of man can do to disprove the BofM and the restoration. God says the BofM is true and Satan says it is a lie even though he knows it is true. Therefore, you are deceived by one who knows the truth. Go figure. Paul O

Cal,Just because faithful Mormons bear their faith promoting stories in which they feel something was not a coincidence-- doesn’t necessarily make their account true and valid from a full perspective not available to their view. Mormons typically want to be a positive people and express grateful hearts in a spirit of thankfulness and this often means that blessings are attributed to God by such and such means whether they really were or not. Remember, we live and walk by faith and not by sight-- we cannot see the whole picture but are creatures of limited view. We just want to be happy in our God... As far as Moroni is concerned; you will see him at the judgment bar of God when things will not be well with you because you ridiculed and rejected the prophets and the Book of Mormon. I’m glad I won’t be in your sorry shoes. What are you going to do then? Paul O

SRM, I consider the following sermon by President Romney to be certified as inspiration to the whole Church under the direction of the President of the Church and it confirms the location of the hill Cumorah. The apostles and prophets of Mormonism are agreed in this matter and so should we: President Marion G. Romney Second Counselor in the First Presidency Marion G. Romney, “America’s Destiny,” Ensign, Nov. 1975, 35 "My beloved brothers and sisters, I bear you my personal witness that I know that the things I have presented to you today are true—both those pertaining to past events and those pertaining to events yet to come"

Antishock, I don’t have a problem with the “Church” funding FARMS. You apparently do. I believe the first Presidency has confidence that those scholarly members will work on trying to be more faithful and at the same time sharpen their archeological skills. BYU is a first rate school and it is my understanding that the school is generally respected worldwide except for their apologetic position on the Book of Abraham in which they are worldwide laughing stocks. I don’t think the Lord will allow the treasures to be unearthed until after the saints are fully tested. It is my preference that excavation will not take place. One must receive a testimony of the BofM by faith and confirmation of the Holy Ghost. That is how the Lord has put this whole program together and the BofM has made it clear that this is how it would be in the last days. If treasures of proof were unearthed, this would upset the manner in which one must receive a testimony as outlined by the BofM and that would in itself discredit the prophecy of how the BofM would be received in the last days. Paul O

That's funny. Then why does BYU fund FARMS? ANSWER: The Church wants to PROVE the Book of Mormon True. The Church is desperate to find anything that would corroborate the BoM's credibility. Which brings me back to the topic of this thread...they could have all the credibility in the world if they (and FARMS) would just bust out some shovels and go to the spot where Joseph Smith said the Great and Final Battle took place...at the Hill Cumorah, NY. Antishock, I don’t give a rat's ___ who in the Church would like to see the BofM proven true archeologically. This proof is neither required and the “Church” is not desperate at all. It just may be that the sign you so want, Antishock, will not be given until it is too late and you will be very sorry. The treasures of Cumorah will come forth in the Lord’s own due time and not by the howls or complaints of the antis or faithless saints. The Church is true and Jesus is the Christ. Paul O

Cal, The Church is not based upon facts that must be proven true to the world. Also, I would much rather have you think I am gullible than deny the witness I have received from God. Paul O

It just wouldn’t be good if our religion was proven true on a secular level after the manner of the world. The Lord has set everything up so we would be tested on faith and not after sight in things that are proven. Otherwise there is no faith and if the BofM was proven on that basis there would no longer be the precious element of faith which is the first principle of the gospel. Sadly, people like Antishock want to destroy the first principle of the gospel as we have received it and shake our testimonies. I say that we should stand firm in the gospel and hearken to the teachings of the scriptures and General Authorities of the Church. Paul O

Antishock, We don’t know where the swords, helmets, and all the rest of the evidence is pertaining to the battle of Cumorah and thereabouts. Our religion is based on faith not facts. Leave us alone and go pick on someone else. You’re just plain mean or in the words of elder Mark E. Peterson-- you are a faith killer! You have been warned well enough. Paul O

Antishock is correct about the position of the Church. Don't listen to the faithless scholars at FARMS who have rejected the word of the Lord in effort to cover up and deny what they refuse to understand based on faith. Here is the word of the Lord from his apostles and prophets to the Latter-day Saints: President Marion G. Romney Second Counselor in the First Presidency Marion G. Romney, “America’s Destiny,” Ensign, Nov. 1975, 35 My beloved brothers and sisters, I invite you to join in a prayer that while I speak you and I may both enjoy the Spirit. I will give you a lesson today that the Lord has taken great pains to bring to us <snip> It is my purpose in making these remarks to point out from the record of ancient inhabitants of America that the foregoing decrees have been carried out. In the western part of the state of New York near Palmyra is a prominent hill known as the “hill Cumorah.” (Morm 6:6) On July twenty-fifth of this year, as I stood on the crest of that hill admiring with awe the breathtaking panorama which stretched out before me on every hand, my mind reverted to the events which occurred in that vicinity some twenty-five centuries ago—events which brought to an end the great Jaredite nation. You who are acquainted with the Book of Mormon will recall that during the final campaign of the fratricidal war between the armies led by Shiz and those led by Coriantumr “nearly two millions” of Coriantumr’s people had been slain by the sword; “two millions of mighty men, and also their wives and their children.” (Ether 15:2) <snip> As I contemplated this tragic scene from the crest of Cumorah and viewed the beautiful land of the Restoration as it appears today, I cried in my soul, “How could it have happened?” <snip> This second civilization to which I refer, the Nephites, flourished in America between 600 B.C. and A.D. 400. Their civilization came to an end for the same reason, at the same place, and in the same manner as did the Jaredites’. <snip> Now my beloved brethren and sisters everywhere, both members of the Church and nonmembers, I bear you my personal witness that I know that the things I have presented to you today are true—both those pertaining to past events and those pertaining to events yet to come =========================== Elder Mark E. Petersen Of the Council of the Twelve Mark E. Petersen, “The Last Words of Moroni,” Ensign, Nov. 1978, 57 Last week we passed one of the most significant anniversaries recognized by our Church. It marked the visitations of the Angel Moroni to the Prophet Joseph Smith, preliminary to the restoration of the gospel of Jesus Christ in our day. <snip> As the fighting neared its end, Mormon gathered the remnant of his forces about a hill which they called Cumorah, located in what is now the western part of the state of New York. Their enemies, known as Lamanites, came against them on this hill. Of that dreadful event Mormon wrote: “My people, with their wives and their children, did now behold the armies of the Lamanites marching towards them; and with that awful fear of death which fills the breasts of all the wicked, did they await to receive them. “… Every soul was filled with terror because of the greatness of their numbers. “And it came to pass that they did fall upon my people with the sword, and with the bow, and with the arrow, and with the ax, and with all manner of weapons of war. “And it came to pass that my men were hewn down, yea, even my ten thousand who were with me, and I fell wounded in the midst.” <snip> When finished with the record, Moroni was to hide it up in that same Hill Cumorah which was their battlefield. It would come forth in modern times as the Book of Mormon, named after Moroni’s father, the historian who compiled it. ============================== Apostle Orson Pratt, Aug. 25, 1878 Journal of Discourses Vol. 20, pg. 62 "The great and last battle, in which several hundred thousand Nephites perished was on the hill Cumorah, the same hill from which the plates were taken by Joseph Smith, the boy about whom I spoke to you the other evening." (Apostle Orson Pratt, Feb. 11, 1872 Journal of Discourses Vol. 14, pg. 331) "Thirty-six years prior to this time his nation was destroyed in in what we term the State of New York, around about a hill, called by that people the Hill of Cumorah, when many hundreds of thousands of the Nephites-men, women and children, fell, during the greatest battle that they had had with the Lamanites." ============================ Apostle Orson Pratt, April 6, 1874 Journal of Discourses Vol. 17, pg. 24 "Finally, they became so utterly wicked, so fully ripened for destruction, that one branch of the nation, called the Nephites, gathered their entire people around the hill Cumorah, in the State of New York , in Ontario County; and the Lamanites, the opposite army, gathered by millions in the same region. The two nations were four years in gathering their forces, during which no fighting took place; but at the end of that time, having marshalled all their hosts, the fighting commenced, the Lamanites coming upon the Nephites, and destroying all of them, except a very few, who had previously deserted over to the Lamanites." ================================= President Anthony W. Ivins, Conference Report, April 1928-Morning Session "The passages which I have quoted from the Book of Mormon and the more extended discussion of this subject by Elder B. H. Roberts which was published in The Deseret News of March 3, 1928, definitely establish the following facts: That the Hill Cumorah, and the Hill Ramah are identical; that it was around this hill that the armies of both the Jaredites and Nephites, fought their great last battles; that it was in this hill that Mormon deposited all of the sacred records which had been entrusted to his care by Ammaron, except the abridgment which he had made from the plates of Nephi, which were delivered into the hands of his' son, Moroni. We know positively that it was in this hill that Moroni deposited the abridgment made by his father, and his own abridgment of the record of the Jaredites, and that it was from this hill that Joseph Smith obtained possession of them. " ======================================= The Latter-day Saints' Messenger and Advocate, Vol.2, No.2, p.221 "Cumorah, the artificial hill of north America, is well calculated to stand in this generation, as a monument of marvelous works and wonders. Around that mount died millions of the Jaredites; yea, there ended one of the greatest nations of this earth. In that day, her inhabitants spread from sea to sea, and enjoyed national greatness and glory, nearly fifteen hundred years. -- That people forsook the Lord and died in wickedness. There, too, fell the Nephites, after they had forgotten the Lord that bought them. There slept the records of age after age, for hundreds of years, even until the time of the Lord." =========================== Apostle James E. Talmage, Articles of Faith , chapter 14 "The hill, which was known by one division of the ancient peoples as Cumorah, by another as Ramah, is situated near Palmyra in the State of New York ." ========================================== Joseph Fielding Smith, Doctrines of Salvation , Vol.3, Bookcraft, 1956, p.232-43. "It is known that the Hill Cumorah where the Nephites were destroyed is the hill where the Jaredites were also destroyed. This hill was known to the Jaredites as Rama. It was approximately near to the waters of Ripliancum, which the Book of Ether says, "by interpretation, is large, or to exceed all." Mormon adds: "And it came to pass that we did march forth to the land of Cumorah, and we did pitch our tents round about the hill Cumorah; and it was in a land of many waters, rivers, and fountains; and here we had hope to gain advantage over the Lamanites." "It must be conceded that this description fits perfectly the land of Cumorah in New York, as it has been known since the visitation of Moroni to the Prophet Joseph Smith, for the hill is in the proximity of the Great Lakes and also in the land of many rivers and fountains. Moreover, the Prophet Joseph Smith himself is on record, definitely declaring the present hill called Cumorah to be the exact hill spoken of in the Book of Mormon. "Further, the fact that all of his associates from the beginning down have spoken of it as the identical hill where Mormon and Moroni hid the records, must carry some weight. It is difficult for a reasonable person to believe that such men as Oliver Cowdery, Brigham Young, Parley P. Pratt, Orson Pratt, David Whitmer, and many others, could speak frequently of the Spot where the Prophet Joseph Smith obtained the plates as the Hill Cumorah, and not be corrected by the Prophet, if that were not the fact. That they did speak of this hill in the days of the Prophet in this definite manner is an established record of history...." =============================== Apostle Bruce R. McConkie, Mormon Doctrine, page 174-175, Bookcraft 1966) "Both the Nephite and Jaredite civilizations fought their final great wars of extinction at and near the Hill Cumorah (or Ramah as the Jaredites termed it), which hill is located between Palmyra and Manchester in the western part of the State of New York. "Joseph Smith, Oliver Cowdery and many of the early brethren, who were familiar with all the circumstances attending the coming forth of the Book of Mormon in this dispensation, have left us a pointed testimony as to the identity and location of Cumorah or Ramah.” ================================== B.H. Roberts, Studies of the Book of Mormon, p.277 "This time it will have to do with so important a matter as a war of extinction of two peoples, the Nephites and the Jaredites, on the self same battle site, with the same 'hill' marking the axis of military movements. By the Nephites this 'hill' was called the 'Hill Cumorah,' by the Jaredites the 'Hill Ramah'; it was that same 'hill,' in which the Nephite records were deposited by Mormon and Moroni, and from which Joseph Smith obtained the Book of Mormon, therefore the 'Mormon Hill,' of today—since the coming forth of the Book of Mormon—near Palmyra, New York. ================================= Apostle LeGrand Richards, in A Marvelous Work and a Wonder, chapter 7, also stated that Cumorah is in New York. ===========================

I can't speak for Peace but I will say that it proves she had a spiritual experience that caused her to believe that the God of Mormonism manifested himself to her in a benevolent way. So, there is no reason for you to question her faith in these things because she has a testimony of those things that are most precious.I too have had a glorious experience (precious pearls) in which the veil burst open and celestial light flooded the room and messengers sent from God confirmed the truthfulenss of the restored Church and my missionary companion was with me seeing the same thing so I know I wasn't just seeing things. Joseph Smith's experience with Moroni is not hard at all for me to comprehend and I'm sure it happened. You are going to be sorry if you don't repent and allow the God of Mormonism to heal your poor soul as you gamble away your salvation to the foolishness of the world. You have been adequately warned and the night will soon come and the harvest will be over-- and your soul not saved. Paul O

Ok. That's good to know. I thought he was being a cry baby but I stand corrected. Thanks for letting me know. Paul O WAIT JUST A SECOND! Why am I so stupid?! I wasn't thinking right in that last post because Antishock *is* a crybaby and he did it to himself by not being careful with his typing. Gee wizz. I stand corrected. Paul O

Ok. That's good to know. I thought he was being a cry baby but I stand corrected. Thanks for letting me know.Paul O

O for crying out loud! Antishock now has the ability to search the hearts and reigns of his fellow LDS friends on this board as they gently pour out their more personal feelings.Why are you here on this board, Antishock? Could it be to convince us poor deceived members of the Church to leave our faith and gain what you think is true happiness? And just how happy are you? You got all mad when someone edited a smily face on your post to try and make you look more happy and you had a hissy. You poor unfortunate soul. Paul O

I've enjoyed your points too, Peace. It's good to know there are faithful people on this LDS message board. Hold to the iron rod! Paul O

I honestly don't think the Lord wants the evidence uncovered because the BofM must be received by faith and not tangible evidence. We don't need masses of faithless people joining the Church just because they find out it's true due to the evidence because they would no sooner fall away and explain the evidence away and perhaps fight against the Church. The wicked Jews explained away Christ after all the evidence he laid at their feet! Many walked away from him even after they first accepted his miracles too. And with that; how do we even know there really was a Christ? Where are the nails that pieced him? I don't know where they are and even if they suddenly were found it wouldn't make any difference because Christ was crucified and a war was fought at Cumorah because God said so. Paul O

LOL...you have got to be kidding me...NO? Well, if you are possitive that those fellas know what they are talking about better than a prophet of God...then you have made your choice. But for me and my house...I believe the history and science books like I believe toilet paper will hold together in water. Yeah, scientists misrepresent themselves and act like they have personally been around for 5,000 plus years studying the earth under a magnifying glass while foolish suckers oohh and aahh over their every little theory as if they were the law of the universe!! Away with the scientists and their false theories! The fact is that today’s scientists are less than 100 years old and they act like they have been around and know what happened 10,000 years ago. They act like their tools and measuring instruments know what happened too. C-14; what a joke! So I ask; who is the more foolish; the fool or the fool who follows a fool? -------------------------- I'm sticking with the scriptures and faith. Paul O

Antishock, We don't know where all the bones and swords are. For all we know they were swept up by the hand of God so that the BofM wouldn't be proven true to the faithless in the last days. B) Paul O

Because as far as I can see you have not placed your trust in God by asking him if the Book of Mormon is true or not. Why should you rely upon archeological proof? Faithful Jews and Christians do not rely upon such proof for Moses in Egypt or other great circumstances that occurred in Bible times, yet we trust them on faith and believe. :) How about you ask God if the Book of Mormon is true and quit trusting in the arm of flesh, including your own. Signs follow those who believe and the Lord expects faith or he is not pleased. That’s the Mormon way, and this is LDS Talk. 1 Ne. 15: 11 "Do ye not remember the things which the Lord hath said?—If ye will not harden your hearts, and ask me in faith, believing that ye shall receive, with diligence in keeping my commandments, surely these things shall be made known unto you." Also, read Moroni chapter 10. What you really need, Antishock, is a testimony of the restored gospel! Paul O

I believe what the Mormon leaders have said. I have faith in God and what has been revealed by revelation. I don't have to have physical evidence to make me believe. Faith is to believe without a sure knowledge which is what hard hearted nonbelievers insist on having in order for them to believe. I believe in Jesus too. I believe the Book of Mormon. I believe there is still time for antishock to repent and come unto Christ and hearken to the Book of Mormon. Paul O