Who Named the Book of Mormon?

[The Folk Prophet]

On 12/26/2017 at 10:47 PM, clbent04 said:

Would you be opposed to the idea of the Church dropping the Book of Mormon title and replacing it with American Testament of Jesus Christ? It would seem so much more fitting, don’t you think? I mean, I just don’t get why it was ever named the Book of Mormon to begin with. Very misleading to what it’s about

The same way the First Book of Joshua is very misleading to what it's about. And the Book of Ruth. And the Book of Samuel. And the Book of Nehemiah. And the Book of Job. And the..., and the..., and the....

[clbent04]

14 minutes ago, The Folk Prophet said:

The same way the First Book of Joshua is very misleading to what it's about. And the Book of Ruth. And the Book of Samuel. And the Book of Nehemiah. And the Book of Job. And the..., and the..., and the....

Not parallel to what I'm saying with the Book of Mormon. The books within the Book of Mormon being named by those who wrote those accounts makes sense. However, Mormon didn't write every book in the Book of Mormon. Again, it's misrepresentative.

[Fether]

1 minute ago, clbent04 said:

Not parallel to what I'm saying with the Book of Mormon. The books within the Book of Mormon being named by those who wrote those accounts makes sense. However, Mormon didn't write every book in the Book of Mormon. Again, it's misrepresentative.

Ether didn’t write the book of Ether. Omni didn’t write all the Book of Omni. Alma didn’t write the whole book of Alma.

[clbent04]

11 minutes ago, Fether said:

Ether didn’t write the book of Ether. Omni didn’t write all the Book of Omni. Alma didn’t write the whole book of Alma.

Ether was written by Ether, abridged by Moroni.

Regardless of who wrote the book, it's not misrepresentative to name the Book of Alma as the Book of Alma when it largely details the life of Alma.

 

Edited June 4, 2019 by clbent04

[Vort]

11 minutes ago, clbent04 said:

Not parallel to what I'm saying with the Book of Mormon. The books within the Book of Mormon being named by those who wrote those accounts makes sense. However, Mormon didn't write every book in the Book of Mormon. Again, it's misrepresentative.

Perhaps in the original instance, but we don't have the original instance. We have only Mormon's compiled and edited version of those originals. The only extensive original writings we have from the Nephites, unfiltered by Mormon or Moroni, are the first third of the present-day Book of Mormon, from 1 Nephi through Omni.

I think this is a rather interesting topic. The first and second books of Nephi along with the books of Jacob, Enos, and Jarom were indeed written by those same-named men. The same is mostly true with the books of Mormon and Moroni, with the caveat that the last part of Mormon was written by Moroni after Mormon's death. But Omni wrote only a small part of the (small) book that bears his name. The books of Mosiah, Alma, Helaman, and third and fourth Nephi were named for the extensive Nephite records that bore the names of those prophets, but seem to include only scattered quotations directly from these sources. (Mosiah was indeed a prophet, by the way.) The words are Mormon's. In fact, throughout the Book of Mormon, from Mosiah through Mormon, we hear the firm editorial voice of Mormon quite a bit, often stopping the narrative to preach "...and thus we see...", calling out the lesson in case we're too dense to understand.

[Fether]

15 minutes ago, clbent04 said:

Ether was written by Ether.

Ether wrote the book of Ether just ad much as Mormon wrote the Book of Mormon. Unless of course you are suggesting Ether was alive both for the tower Babel and the collapse of the Jaredite people

[The Folk Prophet]

34 minutes ago, clbent04 said:

Not parallel to what I'm saying with the Book of Mormon. The books within the Book of Mormon being named by those who wrote those accounts makes sense. However, Mormon didn't write every book in the Book of Mormon. Again, it's misrepresentative.

Actually it's pretty exactly parallel.

2 minutes ago, Fether said:

Ether wrote the book of Ether just ad much as Mormon wrote the Book of Mormon. Unless of course you are suggesting Ether was alive both for the tower Babel and the collapse of the Jaredite people

Technically Moroni "wrote" the book of Ether.

 

[clbent04]

1 minute ago, Fether said:

Ether wrote the book of Ether just ad much as Mormon wrote the Book of Mormon. Unless of course you are suggesting Ether was alive both for the tower Babel and the collapse of the Jaredite people

I see your point, but again, not parallel to the original point I'm making. When Moroni abridged the Book of Ether from those 24 plates, the Book of Ether didn't suddenly become the Book of Moroni simply because Moroni abridged the record. 

[clbent04]

3 minutes ago, The Folk Prophet said:

Technically Moroni "wrote" the book of Ether.

Do you think it would be representative of you to read someone's autobiography, summarize it in two pages, and then call it your story?

[Fether]

Just now, The Folk Prophet said:

Actually it's pretty exactly parallel.

Technically Moroni "wrote" the book of Ether.

 

Ok how about this. We change the name to The Book of Nephi, Jacob Enos Jarom Omni Amaron Chemish Abinadom Amaleki Mormon Mosiah Alma Moroni Helaman and Nephi.

Am at forgetting anyone?

[The Folk Prophet]

1 minute ago, clbent04 said:

Do you think it would be representative of you to read someone's autobiography, summarize it in two pages, and then call it your story?

You are implying by this question that you believe Mormon named the Book of Mormon as he did because he believed it was his story.

Of course if it were common to name a large literary work after the person who put it together then to collect stories and quotes and then call the book after oneself would, indeed, be appropriate.

But the point is really this: That's what Mormon named the collection. Whether it does or does not "represent" what the book actually says, it is what it is. That's what it's called.

Can I see the point that naming it that way caused trouble? Maybe. Seems to me that such trouble was bound to be caused whatever it was named, because Satan's rallying his forces against God and all His works. It also strikes me that God, if he so wished, could have inspired Mormon, Joseph, or any of the following prophets, at any time, to correct such a mistake if it was, indeed, a mistake and not God's will. Who knows though. Perhaps that will yet happen. But I expect the naming of it and the ensuing labeling of us as "Mormons" and the confusion and bitterness the world has surrounding the matter is part of the overall test of our faith and is as God means things to be.

[CV75]

17 hours ago, clbent04 said:

Do you think it would be representative of you to read someone's autobiography, summarize it in two pages, and then call it your story?

Yes, because at that point is does indeed become my story, and as I mentioned in 2017, that includes my testimony of what i summarized and the commandment of the Lord to do so.

[Vort]

On 6/4/2019 at 12:20 PM, clbent04 said:

Do you think it would be representative of you to read someone's autobiography, summarize it in two pages, and then call it your story?

Of course. We associate the name of Edward Gibbon with his work The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, yet Gibbon was not an ancient Roman, and pulled literally all of his knowledge about the ancient Roman empire from the works of others. We associate the great ancient historian Herodotus with the histories of the Greek-Persian wars, even though he was not yet born when those wars began, and it's possible that Herodotus himself never directly participated in any of those wars. Histories are commonly associated with those who compiled them, not necessarily with those who wrote the original materials upon which those histories are based.

[clbent04]

7 hours ago, CV75 said:

Yes, because at that point is does indeed become my story, and as I mentioned in 2017, that includes my testimony of what i summarized and the commandment of the Lord to do so.

Thinking about it, I understand the reason behind what you're saying, but it still seems like plagiarism in a sense of putting your name on someone else's work you summarized.  

3 minutes ago, Vort said:

Of course. We associate the name of Edward Gibbon with his work The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, yet Gibbon was not an ancient Roman, and pulled literally all of his knowledge about the ancient Roman empire from the works of others. We associate the great ancient historian Herodotus with the histories of the Greek-Persian wars, even though he was not yet born when those wars began, and it's possible that Herodotus himself never directly participated in any of those wars. Histories are commonly associated with those who compiled them, not necessarily with those who wrote the original materials upon which those histories are based.

I guess this is part of where my confusion has stemmed as to why the Book of Mormon is named as such.  I didn't realize histories are commonly named after those who compiled the information together.

I also didn't realize before that Mormon had summarized and interjected his own inspirations into the Book of Mormon as much as he did.  I thought his abridgment of the plates entailed more of his compiling the information together rather than summarizing and simplifying the messages for us in as many of the books as he touched.

Part of my confusion remains however as to why the entire volume of scripture comprised of many books is accredited to just one prophet in the naming of the entire volume.   It makes more sense to me now, and maybe if I mull it over a bit longer all my confusion will clear up.

[CV75]

16 hours ago, clbent04 said:

Thinking about it, I understand the reason behind what you're saying, but it still seems like plagiarism in a sense of putting your name on someone else's work you summarized.  

I guess this is part of where my confusion has stemmed as to why the Book of Mormon is named as such.  I didn't realize histories are commonly named after those who compiled the information together.

I also didn't realize before that Mormon had summarized and interjected his own inspirations into the Book of Mormon as much as he did.  I thought his abridgment of the plates entailed more of his compiling the information together rather than summarizing and simplifying the messages for us in as many of the books as he touched.

Part of my confusion remains however as to why the entire volume of scripture comprised of many books is accredited to just one prophet in the naming of the entire volume.   It makes more sense to me now, and maybe if I mull it over a bit longer all my confusion will clear up.

I think if I gave proper attribution, as Mormon did (repeatedly), see "Words of Mormon" for example; note verse 3 where it is his assignment to abridge), I think I’d be OK. I’m not sure what the standards for plagiarism were in his day, anyway!

I think Mormon named it such not for credit, but out of stewardship: "And now I, Mormon, proceed to finish out my record, which I take from the plates of Nephi; and I make it according to the knowledge and the understanding which God has given me." (Words of Mormon 1:9).

The same goes for the individual record bearing his name: "And now I, Mormon, make a record of the things which I have both seen and heard, and call it the Book of Mormon." (Mormon 1:1).

[Emmanuel Goldstein]

On 6/4/2019 at 11:32 AM, Vort said:

Most definitely not so. Mormon himself talks about deliberately searching out the small plates of Nephi and inserting them into his abridgment. He did this after he had abridged the Book of Lehi and before he abridged the Book of Mosiah. See his explanation as recorded in the Words of Mormon. Here is an excerpt:

Note from the final words quoted above that Mormon didn't actually know why the Spirit was telling him to include the Small Plates. He wasn't told about the lost 116 pages, or that his translation of the Book of Lehi would be entirely lost to our generation. Perhaps the Lord was just saving him from the heartache and frustration of knowing that all his previous work would be for naught, at least for the first few hundred years of the Restoration. In any case, it's certainly clear that Nephi's Small Plates were very much a part of Mormon's abridgment.

I don't deny that the plates may have been "with" the abridgment, but Joseph also said he returned the plates to Moroni and then some plates were brought to him later to translate the lost items. Why didn't Joseph translate the small plates while he was translating the abridgment then? Keep in mind that the repository is also in the Hill Cumorah in upstate New York, the Small Plates were most probably there as well.

But I don't really care to argue as I don't really have the time. I think we can all agree that it was a good thing that the Small Record was available in some form so we have the story of Nephi and his family. The fact that we have the Book of Mormon is a miracle and I am very grateful for it.

[person0]

2 hours ago, Emmanuel Goldstein said:

Keep in mind that the repository is also in the Hill Cumorah in upstate New York

More like, a portal to a repository (for those specific visitors at that time), or perhaps a vision.

[Emmanuel Goldstein]

On 6/6/2019 at 2:11 PM, person0 said:

More like, a portal to a repository (for those specific visitors at that time), or perhaps a vision.

That is not what Brigham Young said. There is no historical or scriptural evidence of a wormhole portal. lol

[person0]

14 hours ago, Emmanuel Goldstein said:

There is no historical or scriptural evidence of a wormhole portal.

Of course there is:

Quote

And after eight days again his disciples were within, and Thomas with them: then came Jesus, the doors being shut, and stood in the midst, and said, Peace be unto you.
(John 20:26)

The type of travel that would enable someone to appear in the middle of a group of people inside a locked room may work on unknown principles, but for all intents and purposes might as well be considered the equivalent of a portal.

[Emmanuel Goldstein]

2 hours ago, person0 said:

Of course there is:

The type of travel that would enable someone to appear in the middle of a group of people inside a locked room may work on unknown principles, but for all intents and purposes might as well be considered the equivalent of a portal.

stepping into our dimension from another is not a portal, it is a simple matter of taking a step. Read some Brian Greene and you will see.

[person0]

23 hours ago, Emmanuel Goldstein said:

stepping into our dimension from another is not a portal, it is a simple matter of taking a step.

That is still the equivalent of travelling through a portal, or have you never played that game?

[Emmanuel Goldstein]

On 6/12/2019 at 7:52 AM, person0 said:

That is still the equivalent of travelling through a portal, or have you never played that game?

lol

[caspianrex]

Seems to me, the decision to append "Another Testament of Jesus Christ" to the title of the Book of Mormon (back in 1981) makes everything pretty clear.

I'm not sure I see why this thread has gone on so long (he says, as he adds one more post to the thread...)