Lucy Mack's Copy of the Book of Mormon

Mormon Times ^ | Feb. 21, 2009 | R. Scott Lloyd

[Colofornian]

A rare 1841 copy of the Book of Mormon that likely belonged to Lucy Mack Smith, mother of the Prophet Joseph Smith, is now owned by the LDS Church, the gift of a church member who wishes to remain anonymous...

Her name imprinted on the base of the book's spine identifies it as Lucy's book, likely a "presentation copy" from the 1841 edition published in England. Because of superior and less-expensive printing and binding, the edition was made there, commissioned by LDS Church apostles on a mission in that land and acting at the behest of Joseph Smith.

It was the fourth edition of the Book of Mormon, the previous ones being the original, published in Palmyra, N.Y., in 1830, the 1837 edition published in Kirtland, Ohio, and the 1840 edition published in Nauvoo.

The book dealer from whom the donor acquired the copy wrote in documentation that the book was discovered in 2002 in Hamilton, Ill., 10 miles outside of Nauvoo, where Lucy died in 1855. It had been owned by descendants of Lucy Smith Milliken, daughter of Lucy Mack, who cared for her mother until Lucy Mack's death.

[Colofornian]

Lucy Mack Smith wrote a book about her son edited by Preston Nibley entitled History of Joseph Smith (Bookcraft, 1958). On pages 74-81, Smith writes about the tales her son will tell them about supposed reappearing manifestations from unnamed "personages" and an angel. A few pages after this, Lucy Mack Smith relates how Smith progressed from there:

"During our evening conversations, Joseph would occasionally give us SOME OF THE MOST AMUSING RECITALS THAT COULD BE IMAGINED. He would describe the ancient inhabitants of this continent, their dress, mode of traveling, and the animals upon which they rode; their cities, their buildings, with every particular; their mode of warfare; and also their religious worship. This he would do with as much ease, seemingly, as if he had spent his whole life among them. On the twenty-second of September, 1824, Joseph again visited the place where he found the [gold] plates the year previous... (p. 83).

How old was Smith here? (Age 17 to 18*).

[*This account is found in chapter 18, which starts off with her saying "the next day" -- (and you have to go back to chapter 17 to find the time frame she was talking about was September 21, 1823 -- found on p. 74). So she is writing about Joseph Smith telling these tall tales somewhere between the ages of 17 and 18...as p. 83 mentions September, 1824.]

Now why is this so important?

Because Lucy Mack Smith says that her son found the golden plates at age 17 and had not even taken the time to carefully examine all the contents of the box they came in, let alone examine these "foreign language" findings. No Mormon claims that he translated these golden plates in the early 1820s. Technically, they weren't even in his close possession because a supposed angel had told him to hide them for a year the same day he found them.

And yet, Smith's mom says of this 17-18 yo youth that he would tell ...SOME OF THE MOST AMUSING RECITALS THAT COULD BE IMAGINED. He would describe the ancient inhabitants of this continent, their dress, mode of traveling, and the animals upon which they rode; their cities, their buildings, with every particular; their mode of warfare; and also their religious worship. This he would do with as much ease, seemingly, as if he had spent his whole life among them..." This was BEFORE Smith claimed to have "translated" the golden plates.

Lucy Mack Smith says Joseph, upon finding the gold plates, cut the bark off of an old log and hid them there, replacing the bark so as to hide them. OK, if you've found a box of gold plates with writing on them hidden in the ground, would you...
...take everything out of the "box" you found and fail to carefully examine all contents therein?
...If you answered you would, well, then, I guess you're not Joseph Smith. Because what does his mom say he did a year after hiding them?

Sept. 22, 1824: After telling his parents about these gold plates, he went to retrieve them and "fully expected to carry them home with him...he put forth his hand [into the log] and took them up, but, as he was taking them hence, the unhappy thought darted through his mind that probably there was something else in the box besides the plates, which would be of some pecuniary advantage to him." (Lucy Mack Smith, p. 83)

What? You mean he had failed to review all the contents of the box he found? (Really?)

So, what did 18 yo Joe do next?
(1) "...he laid them down very carefully... [which supposedly broke an injuction an angel had given him a year earlier]
(2) He covered it. Why? "...lest some one might happen to pass that way and get whatever there might be remaining in it..."
(3) "...he turned round to take the Record again, but behold it was gone, and where, he knew not, neither did he know the means by which it had been taken from him. At this, as a natural consequence, he was much alarmed." (Lucy Mack Smith, pp. 83-84)

(For breaking the injunction, he said the angel appeared again and told him why they were gone)

What happened next, says Lucy Mack Smith? Well, somehow the gold plates were returned to their original resting place (must have been by the angel -- tho she doesn't say how Joseph knew they had been returned there). He looked there, and behold, there they were. And it came to pass that he tried to reobtain the plates, but the angel abused him -- hurling him "back upon the ground with great violence."

So, here his parents were now expecting him to bring home the golden plates:

If your 17 yo son told you about some gold plates he found that he had been told by an angel to hide for a year, and then went to retrieve them a year later and came home empty-handed, what you do think the story might include as to why he was empty-handed?

Yup. That's right. To paraphrase Joe Smith, Jr., "The angel made me NOT do it":

"As he was aware that we would expect him to bring the plates home with him, he was greatly troubled, fearing that we might doubt his having seen them. As soon as he entered the house, my husband asked if he had obtained the plates. The answer was, 'No, father, I could not get them.'...'I would have taken them,' rejoined his father, with much earnestness, 'if I had been in your place.' 'Why,' returned Joseph, in quite a subdued tone, 'you do not know what you would say. I could not get them, for the angel of the Lord would not let me.'" (Lucy Mack Smith, p. 84)

(Yeah, right)

[SkyDancer]

Just wondering - didn’t he write that he did take the plates and ran home with them, or was that later?

[Colofornian]

If he did, a story could be weaved that he did both. First took them home & then immediately hid them away from the home. (There had to be a wee bit of time between finding them & an angel “appearing” to him)

[ConservativeMind]

That original version, the fraud exposed and ripped apart in 1842, by Alexander Campbell:

http://www.mun.ca/rels/restmov/texts/acampbell/tme/TME00.HTM

[ConservativeMind]

Sorry, the actual one used that was ripped apart was the original version from 1837, as noted in the references:

1. “The Book of Mormon; by Joseph Smith, Jr., author and proprietor. Palmyra, printed by E. B. Grandin, for the author, 1836.”

It was from his and others’ critiques that the rewrites then attempted to make the fraud more consistent.

[SkyDancer]

I’ve read the various stories about the plates and how they were translated and all that - like first he translted them (pictures showing him doing that) then an angel telling him what to write (with a picture of an angel pointing) - anyway, it was just curious is all ....

[greyfoxx39]

That is a very interesting site. Thanks for posting it.

[Godzilla]

I’ve read the various stories about the plates and how they were translated and all that - like first he translted them (pictures showing him doing that) then an angel telling him what to write (with a picture of an angel pointing) - anyway, it was just curious is all ....

The testimony of the Three Witnesses of the Book of Mormon (the same individuals whose testimony appears in the front of every copy of the Book of Mormon), as well as Joseph Smith’s wife, Emma Hale Smith. They tell a similar story of Joseph dropping a magical seer stone into his hat, then burying his face in the hat and proceeding to dictate the Book of Mormon. Joseph claimed to see in the darkened hat the words he dictated. Several of the witnesses comment that the gold plates were sometimes not even in sight as Joseph dictated the Book of Mormon.

[ConservativeMind]

I fear the one I show there is a reprisal of an earlier one, but not the original one I read which was done, completely, by Alexander Campbell, in 1832. It was at that time that they were using the first edition of the Book of Mormon.

All three of these critiques appeared in the Millennial Harbinger, but, as the following says from the link below, the first set of articles critiquing the Book of Mormon was from 1831, many years before the link I first provided.

“This review of Mr. Campbell came out first in the ‘Millennial Harbinger’, a monthly periodical published by him in Bethany, Virginia, under date of February 7th, 1831.”

http://www.mun.ca/rels/restmov/texts/acampbell/delusions.html

[SkyDancer]

So what you’re saying is he didn’t sit down with the golden plates and read/translated them? I also read where he would be behind a curtain and pass out the translated pages - I guess then there were different ways he translated?

[Tennessee Nana]

Alexander Campbell had reason to be mad at Sm,ith...

Campbell called his church the Church of Christ and Sidney Rigdon was one of his followers and preachers...

When Rigdon joined Smith, Smith started calling his own gang, the “Church of Christ” at first...

Although Smith didnt haqve a Christian message...

Campbell was preaching from the Bible ...

Campbell didnt want his name linked with the blasphemeous Smith...

Smith and Rigdon stole many of Campbell’s followers...

[Tennessee Nana]

Rock in hat...

Face in hat...

Read rock...

[SkyDancer]

I thought he was sick and throwing up ...

[Tennessee Nana]

Yes, and no...

But the mess that landed on the paper has the same smell...

[SkyDancer]

I’ve lived with a Mormon family, read their stuff. Their home was a magnet home (they assisted several missionaries, did their wash, had dinner, etc) - anyway, there was no way I could believe that stuff, no way. It is so contradictory.

[ConservativeMind]

The sad part of the Book of Mormon is that a former associate of Alexander Campbell, Sidney Rigdon, was probably the most likely person to have written most of the Book of Mormon.

Alexander Campbell was one of the founders of the Restoration Movement, which basically said that all the truth we need to know is in the Word of God, meaning the Bible. Additionally, the movement described the need for unity in core principles, but allowance in non-core principles. Of course, determining the line between such areas could be difficult.

This movement had no actual leader, though. Campbell, nor others, were ever “in charge.” It was a fully decentralized approach to Christianity.

That said, one movement that came out of that was the Disciples of Christ Christian church, which did start a centralized governing body. The other two lines of churches the movement spawned was the much larger collection of independent Church of Christs throughout the country, and the smaller collection of Christian churches, which somewhat mirror the Church of Christ, but have basically allowed musical instruments.

Of these, in order of liberalism in the current day, the Disciples of Christ is by far the most liberal (15 years ago it was endorsing gay rights parades), followed by the Christian church (many are now contemporary services and many don't have problems with divorced elders, etc.), followed by the Church of Christ (of which there are probably 20+ strains of mostly conservative bodies). The United Church of Christ has a small connection with the Disciples of Christ, but really came from the merger of the Congregational, Evangelical, and Reformed churches primarily.

I would never willingly attend a UCC or a Disciples of Christ church, as both are extreme to very liberal now.

[Tennessee Nana]

(they assisted several missionaries, did their wash, had dinner, etc)
________________________________________

Isnt that unusual ????

from what I’ve read the missionaries are pretty much on their own...

They should be helped though...

[Godzilla]

Joseph Smith never specifically state HOW he translated the bom - he gave no details. The images of the plates being behind a curtain or smith busy writing the translation down are part of a myth passed on down. The following links evaluate what the documented translation process was by those very scribes he used to write the words he translated down!

http://www.irr.org/mit/divination.html

http://www.lds-mormon.com/transltn.shtml

http://www.utlm.org/newsletters/no105.htm#Urim

http://www.utlm.org/newsletters/no95.htm#How%20were%20the%20Plates%20Translated

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0sECvoqzi4A

http://www.mormonthink.com/transbomweb.htm#whatdidjosephsay
this last one is a mormon site

Bottom line is the myth, and there is the eyewitness accounts from his scribes.

[ConservativeMind]

That is my understanding, as well.

You are well-informed on this topic.

[Tennessee Nana]

Is that the modern Church of Christ with no music etc ???