Joseph Smith

Bryce Anderson bryce_anderson@yahoo.com
Tue, 6 Oct 1998 20:22:59 -0700 (PDT) (00907748579, 19981007032259.256.rocketmail@send1b.yahoomail.com) 





---GR8granpa@aol.com wrote:

>

> 

> VAUJIN

> I wrote to Dr. Shelly asking him to answer a question I had on the

> resurrection.  As you may or may not know, Dr. Shelly believes that

the

> resurrection of Jesus is a historically verifiable event, as much or

more

> so as any event from antiquity.  I asked him, since Luke, Paul, and

Mark

> must be excluded as eyewitnesses to the events of Easter morning, then

> Christianity can only claim at most two eyewitnesses to the events of

> Easter morning, Matthew and John.  Mormonism, however, can claim

eleven

> eyewitnesses to the golden plates that the angel Moroni gave to Joe

Smith.

> Therefore, if we are going to claim that the resurrection of Jesus

was a

> historically verifiable event, then shouldn't we also claim that the

> beginning of Mormonism was also a historically verifiable event?  His

> response is below, I thought some of you might enjoy reading it.  I

have

> yet to ask his permission to publicize a private email.  I hope he

doesn't

> mind.

> 

> DON

> I would not believe anything the mormon Prophet (profit) Joseph

Smith said. At

> one time it is recorded, he claimed "People lived on the moon". 

This is from

> another one of these self proclaimed prophets who spoke with this

Biblegod.

> Wouldn't this Biblegod know that life on the moon is impossible? 

This proves

> Smith was a fake.

> (Or was he trying to show that Biblegod is a fake?)

>        Hmmmm. A flipped coin here might just land on edge.

> 


BRYCE
     Actually, it was Brigham Young who had a vision of men on the
moon.  They looked like us, but with more blond people per capita. 
There may also have been men on the sun.

     The eleven witnesses, from what I've studied, aren't so hard and
fast a case as the LDS would have people believe, but I fear I'm
already too far off topic.

     As for historicity debates, I was reading the 1996 Barker/Horner
debate, (somewhere on the II pages), and I noticed that Horner made a
big deal about how "two generations are necessary for a legend to win
out over historical truth."  I can point to at least one legend in LDS
history that developed within ten years of the events.  I haven't
worked it out completely, but it does seem to indicate that legends
can develop a heckuvalot faster than apologists claim.  I'll try and
post something when I get back.

     Oh, the Army changed its mind, and I'm leaving on the 8th.  In
case anyone was wondering why I haven't left.
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