Ah, the great "waffler" apologist...
...knowing that he can't deny how bad the end result appeared...spelling wise, grammar wise, mistakes in the text, etc.
-- and how much editing was LATER needed to the document to make it appear King James-Bible like...
...Mormon apologist Ash knows he can't strictly hold to the first position...
...but then he knows if he holds the second position, strictly speaking, how on earth would Smith have known how to spell all of the proper names that pop up?
Therefore, he is compelled to believe that when it came to proper names, the Mormon god revealed His thoughts one way -- literally & straightforward without extra steps -- as if the spelling of proper names was the most important thing God had in mind...the Mormon god must be fanatical about spelling of places, I guess...
...but then on the most important things -- the historical & theological components, the Mormon god decided to let Smith do a lot of "free hand" translation??? (Yeah, right)
Ping for later
Either way, the aim was to sell the book for a profit...
Smith remained silent and elusive because had he opened his mouth it would have quicky shown him to be the fraud that he is.
The translation process was reported by the scribes themselves - Emma, David Whitmer and Martin Harris - thus making it 'first hand' in that respect. Oliver Cowdery was Joseph's principal scribe for the Book of Mormon is silent on the matter, however, he is also linked to Rigdon and others and is probably duplicit in procuring the outside materials plagerized into the bom.
According to this position, the English translation represents a fairly literal-translation from the Nephite text. It's important to note that such a translation would only have been "fairly literal" for at least three reasons:
Here Ash is misrepresenting (building a strawman) of the "tight control" method. He is claiming essentially that Smith had control over the wording. However, if you review the testimonies of Emma, David Whitmer and Martin Harris (upon which this 'theory' is based), it was the stone itself that projected the wording - not Smith's 'translating' abilities. Ash tries to foist this onto Smith to avoid the reality that the method clearly took smith out of the loop and directly to the seer stone (under the power of god).
The second position held by many LDS scholars is a "loose control" view of the Book of Mormon translation. According to this view, Joseph was more than a mere fax machine for the English translation. Instead of seeing God-revealed English words, Joseph would have received God-given impressions that conveyed ideas, images, or concepts to Joseph's mind. Joseph then would have formulated -- in his own language -- words that expressed and conveyed those impressions.
This answer fails on a couple of points - using EITHER the seer stone OR the "Urim and Thummin" IF smith had been given the POWER to translate the writings, he would not have needed these props. IF smith had not used these props, then this could have been a "reasonable" theory. But the fact is that he DID use them and relied upon THEM to translate the material FOR HIM. Ash defeats his own arguement here:
When English words were formed, that "fairly" accurately expressed those impressions, Joseph could have seen the result of such formulations as English text in the Urim and Thummim -- which he then dictated to his scribe.
Once again, it is the 'prop' doing the translating - not smith - and any error in the 'translation' would be due to "god" and not smith.
And yet...
About this edition: Some minor errors in the text have been perpetuated in
past editions of the Book of Mormon. This edition contains corrections that
seem appropriate to bring the material into conformity with prepublication
manuscripts and early editions edited by the Prophet Joseph Smith.
"Now the way he translated was he put the urim and thummim into his hat and Darkned his Eyes than he would take a sentance and it would apper in Brite Roman Letters. Then he would tell the writer and he would write it. Then that would go away the next sentance would Come and so on. But if it was not Spelt rite it would not go away till it was rite, so we see it was marvelous. Thus was the hol [whole] translated."---Joseph Knight's journal.
"In writing for your father I frequently wrote day after day, often sitting at the table close by him, he sitting with his face buried in his hat, with the stone in it, and dictating hour after hour with nothing between us."
(History of the RLDS Church, 8 vols.(Independence, Missouri: Herald House,1951),"Last Testimony of Sister Emma [Smith Bidamon]," 3:356.
"I, as well as all of my father's family, Smith's wife, Oliver Cowdery and Martin Harris, were present during the translation. . . . He [Joseph Smith] did not use the plates in translation."
---(David Whitmer,as published in the "Kansas City Journal," June 5, 1881,and reprinted in the RLDS "Journal of History", vol. 8, (1910), pp. 299-300.
In an 1885 interview, Zenas H. Gurley, then the editor of the RLDS Saints Herald, asked Whitmer if Joseph had used his "Peep stone" to do the translation. Whitmer replied:
"... he used a stone called a "Seers stone," the "Interpreters" having been taken away from him because of transgression. The "Interpreters" were taken from Joseph after he allowed Martin Harris to carry away the 116 pages of Ms [manuscript] of the Book of Mormon as a punishment, but he was allowed to go on and translate by use of a "Seers stone" which he had, and which he placed in a hat into which he buried his face, stating to me and others that the original character appeared upon parchment and under it the translation in English."
"Martin Harris related an incident that occurred during the time that he wrote that portion of the translation of the Book of Mormon which he was favored to write direct from the mouth of the Prophet Joseph Smith. He said that the Prophet possessed a seer stone, by which he was enabled to translate as well as from the Urim and Thummim, and for convenience he then used the seer stone, Martin explained the translation as follows: By aid of the seer stone, sentences would appear and were read by the Prophet and written by Martin and when finished he would say 'Written,' and if correctly written that sentence would disappear and another appear in its place, but if not written correctly it remained until corrected, so that the translation was just as it was engraven on the plates, precisely in the language then used."
(Edward Stevenson, "One of the Three Witnesses,"reprinted from Deseret News, 30 Nov. 1881in Millennial Star, 44 (6 Feb. 1882): 86-87.)
In 1879, Michael Morse, Emma Smith's brother-in-law, stated:"When Joseph was translating the Book of Mormon [I] had occasion more than once to go into his immediate presence, and saw him engaged at his work of translation. The mode of procedure consisted in Joseph's placing the Seer Stone in the crown of a hat, then putting his face into the hat, so as to entirely cover his face, resting his elbows upon his knees, and then dictating word after word, while the scribes Emma, John Whitmer, O. Cowdery, or some other wrote it down."
(W.W. Blair interview with Michael Morse,Saints Herald, vol. 26, no. 12June 15, 1879, pp. 190-91.)
Joseph Smith's brother William also testified to the "face in the hat" version:"The manner in which this was done was by looking into the Urim and Thummim, which was placed in a hat to exclude the light, (the plates lying near by covered up), and reading off the translation, which appeared in the stone by the power of God"("A New Witness for Christ in America,"Francis W. Kirkham, 2:417.)
"The manner in which he pretended to read and interpret was the same manner as when he looked for the money-diggers, with the stone in his hat, while the book of plates were at the same time hid in the woods."---Isaac Hale (Emma Smith's father's) affidavit, 1834.