Alma 24:7-10

Jonah Barnes pointed out something in Alma 24:7-10 on Ward Radio.

https://youtu.be/eVsplMUutsA?t=1709

if you look in verse uh seven, okay, it says and and you can apply this to

27:44

that. I thank my God that God in his goodness has sent us our brethren to preach to us to convince us of the

27:51

traditions of our wicked fathers. If you believe in the Mesoamerican model, you

27:56

can repent. There's forgiveness for you. Okay? You can repent of that wicked

28:04

tradition of your father.  And look, it says, "We might repent of the

28:10

of these things, these wicked traditions, and be forgiven of the many sins that we've committed."

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See, look at this. And we can come into the fold of the Heartlanders. This is so great. It's so meta, right? It's so meta

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that Mormon foresaw the skepticism of those of those guys and he knew it was

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coming and he prepared this version just for just for y'all. So, you can repent of that. 

:)

Back when I believed M2C

I empathize with BYU students, institute and seminary students, and everyone who was taught the Mesoamerican/two-Cumorahs theory (M2C) because I, too, used to believe all of that when I was a student.

I didn't know there were any other scenarios.

It was many years before I even heard of an alternative.

Now, in our day, the people who taught M2C and their followers all know about the alternative interpretations of the text that are faithful to what Joseph and Oliver taught all along. But few of them tell their students, readers, and listeners about the alternatives to M2C.

They should do so.

This all reminds me of a famous statement:

“One of the bittersweet things about growing old is realizing how mistaken you were when you were young. As a young political leftist, I saw the left as the voice of the common man. Nothing could be further from the truth.” — Thomas Sowell

More SITH stories and the end of M2C

More and more Latter-day Saints are discovering that the historical evidence corroborates and supports what Joseph Smith and Oliver Cowdery claimed about the origin and setting of the Book of Mormon.

We empathize with the scholars who have long promoted their theories that Joseph and Oliver misled everyone. Their M2C (Mesoamerican/two-Cumorahs) theory is based on the premise that they were wrong about the New York Cumorah. Their SITH (stone-in-the-hat) theory is based on the premise that Joseph didn't really translate the engravings on the plates by means of the Urim and Thummim that came with the plates, as he said, but instead read words out loud as they appeared on a seer stone (aka the "peep stone") that he put into a hat, as described in the 1834 anti-Mormon book Mormonism Unvailed. See, e.g., https://www.ldshistoricalnarratives.com/p/the-sith-problem-1829-2024.html,

M2C. Oliver explained it is a fact that the hill Cumorah/Ramah in New York is the same hill where Joseph found the plates. He had good reasons to make that declaration, which Joseph endorsed multiple times. Once we understand that Joseph translated two separate sets of plates, we can see how the historical evidence validates what Joseph and Oliver taught. 

I did another interview about the two sets of plates on Mormon Book Reviews, here:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2bCVFCOVdfg

_____

SITH. Royal Skousen's claim that Joseph and Oliver deliberately misled everyone about the translation has been embraced by several prominent LDS scholars and organizations. For example, recently the Interpreter published two articles in their ongoing effort to promote SITH. They were written by Jeff Lindsay, who is a great guy but whose SITH filters, along with the SITH filters of the editorial board of the Interpreter, prevent them from seeing that the evidence they cite for SITH is actually evidence that Joseph and Oliver told the truth about the translation of the Book of Mormon.

I discussed the articles here:

https://interpreterpeerreviews.blogspot.com/2026/02/jeff-lindsays-moses-parallels.html

In a separate post, I introduced the topic:

https://interpreterpeerreviews.blogspot.com/2026/02/explanation-of-post-on-jeff-lindsays.html

Thursday, February 12, 2026

Explanation of post on Jeff Lindsay's Moses article

 

To understand Jeff's argument in the articles discussed in my previous two posts, it helps to understand his underlying framework.  

Jeff is an acolyte of Royal Skousen and Skousen's argument that Joseph and Oliver were misleading everyone when they repeatedly wrote that the Book of Mormon was translated by means of the Nephite interpreters which came with the plates. Instead Jeff and Royal believe David Whitmer's claims that Joseph only read off exact words from Joseph's old scrying stone in a hat (SITH = stone-in-the-hat) - with Royal's further claim that much of that was for some reason in Early Modern English (EME). This was the claim made in the 1834 anti-Mormon book Mormonism Unvailed, presented there as an alternative to the Urim and Thummim explanation that Joseph and Oliver gave.

Jeff, Royal, and other modern LDS scholars who promote SITH have adopted the Mormonism Unvailed "peep stone" narrative based on their belief that Joseph and Oliver were not telling the truth about the translation.

I have discussed the many problems with these views elsewhere.  The only alternate theory Jeff considers is that Joseph was the sole author of both the Book of Mormon and the Book of Moses with only the KJV as an external source.  Any similarity between the Book of Mormon and the Book of Moses not exactly as found in the KJV is then ascribed to them both being from a common ancient source such as the brass plates. 

The immediate obvious problem is that this assumes that in the year between the translation of the two books Joseph forgot everything in the Book of Mormon and never read it either.  This appears ridiculous on its face, even if one believes Joseph only saw the text once on the scrying stone.

The larger problem is that Jeff ignores a much better alternate hypothesis.  This is that Joseph told the truth that he actually translated the "engravings on the plates" (D&C 10) to produce the Book of Mormon "after the manner of [his] language" (D&C 1:24) and thus both works reflected Joseph's own vocabulary and phrasing.  In the tables in the posts I showed that most of Jeff's "parallels" actually reflect language that either actually is in the KJV, is seen in parts of the Book of Mormon unrelated to the Book of Moses story, used by Joseph in D&C revelations or is found in contemporary sources accessible to Joseph such as the writings of Jonathan Edwards.  

Now it is possible that the Book of Moses was on the brass plates and known to the Book of Mormon authors.  As I pointed out, Moroni alluded to that.

A few of Jeff (and Noel Reynold's) parallels may suggest that this is the case.  

However, Jeff obscures this possibility by way overstating his argument and ignoring a better alternate explanation of Joseph as active translator.  While I appreciate Jeff's apologetic motive, it is no service to that cause to build an argument on runaway parallelomania and ignoring better explanations because they challenge his biases.

And, as usual, readers of the Interpreter will never learn about this alternative explanation that supports and corroborates what Joseph and Oliver claimed because the editorial position of the Interpreter uniformly promotes SITH.

More on the BYU Studies article

In response to questions people have asked, here are some observations on the BYU Studies article about the two sets of plates by Don Bradley, titled "Were Nephi’s Small Plates Contained in Mormon’s Gold Plates?" (See links to two versions of the article below.)

1. Excellent article. This is an outstanding article that I hope every Latter-day Saint around the world eventually reads. I applaud BYU Studies for publishing it.

There are some details that are problematic, as I'll discuss below, but I encourage multiple working hypotheses so that's all good. 

The article is a wonderful introduction to the topic. Interested readers can find additional information on mobom.org, in Whatever Happened to the Golden Plates? and other references. 

2. The Mary Whitmer account.

One of the recurring questions people ask me is why Moroni appeared to Mary Whitmer as an old man. That's the narrative in Saints, as discussed here. This is also the narrative missionaries at the Whitmer farm have related (although hopefully they've finally stopped doing that).

Hopefully this article will make progress in correcting the historical narrative because Bradley quotes the actual source instead of the Saints narrative.  

That Mary Whitmer named the messenger “Brother Nephi” may echo the name of Nephi’s small plates that the messenger showed to her.33

This Moroni meets Mary narrative is a prime example of how historical narratives are created and perpetuated, even when they contradict the historical record and basic logic and theology. It's also a fascinating example of how difficult it is to correct narratives. We all understand that the printed Saints books cannot be recalled, but there is no good excuse for not correcting the digital versions, which are by far the most read, especially internationally.

The Moroni narrative is problematic because, among other things, it (i) contradicts what Mary herself said, (ii) contradicts Oliver Cowdery's description of Moroni, (iii) contradicts David Whitmer's accounts of his conversations with both Moroni and the messenger with the plates, and (iv) alters our understanding of the resurrection, because the Moroni narrative frames resurrected beings as shape-shifters who can assume alternative identities and appearances, contrary to the restoration explanation of Alma 11:44.

Bradley's Note 33 is important.

33. That Nephi was involved at some point in the reception or transportation of plates is suggested by Joseph Smith’s conflation of Nephi and Moroni in the earliest draft of his 1838 History. “History Drafts, 1838–Circa 1841,” 222. (See also discussion of this variant in “History Drafts, 1838–Circa 1841,” 223n56.) Were Nephi not involved in some such way, it is difficult to understand why both Mary Whitmer and the Prophet Joseph employed the name Nephi as that of a messenger involved in the coming forth of the book of plates.

For a more complete analysis, see https://www.mobom.org/moroni-and-nephi

3. Illustrations: Text vs .pdf version.

If makes a difference if you read the text version or the .pdf/print version.

Text version: https://byustudies.byu.edu/article/were-nephis-small-plates-contained-in-mormons-gold-plates

pdf/text version: https://website-files-bucket.s3.us-west-2.amazonaws.com/issues/issue_pdfs/64-4final.pdf

The text version omits the graphics. Let's discuss those.

4. The two categories of plates.

The page facing the start of the article features this delightful illustration by Ben Crowder.

(click to enlarge)

This illustration, titled By the Gift and Power of God, offers a useful distinction between the original plates of Nephi and the abridged plates. This is an excellent depiction of the distinction made in the article between the plates Joseph translated in Harmony, PA (the abridged plates) and the plates Joseph translated in Fayette, NY (the plates of Nephi).

However, the caption is a little misleading, so I offer some corrections. 

Original caption	Corrected caption
The rectangles in the left column represent the books written on the small plates of Nephi.	The rectangles in the left column represent the books translated from the plates of Nephi (D&C 10) [We only have what Joseph translated.]
The rectangles in the right column represent those on the large plates.	The rectangles in the right column represent those translated from the abridged plates. [The "large plates" were the original sources for the abridged plates.]

_____

5. The SITH debacle.

The next graphic, embedded on page 40, is Anthony Sweat's infamous SITH illustration that contradicts everything Joseph and Oliver ever said about the translation. This illustration of the SITH narrative from Mormonism Unvailed has become ubiquitous. 

(click to enlarge)

The article claims that "artistic depictions, and therefore common Latter-day Saint visualizations, have often portrayed Joseph translating by simply reading from the plates with the naked eye--not using a sacred seeing implement (fig. 1)."

That is a good point, in a way. There are some illustrations of Joseph translating plates that do not show the Urim and Thummim, but there are others that do show the Urim and Thummim. Most show Joseph studying the plates, not dictating the translation. 

Below are some well-known visualizations, including one on the cover of the Ensign. But note that the Ensign cover, as well as several of the others, depict Joseph looking on the plates as if studying the characters. That is what Joseph explained. "I commenced copying the characters off the plates. I copied a considerable number of them, and by means of the Urim and Thummim I translated some of them..." (Joseph Smith—History 1:62)

The illustration in the upper left shows Joseph presumably dictating as Oliver writes, with no evidence of the Urim and Thummim. The one in the center bottom shows the Urim and Thummim. The one in the center depicts SITH. Multiple working hypotheses, etc.

When we reviewed the existing artwork about the translation, we were unable to find a single illustration of Joseph using the Urim and Thummim while engaging with the plates by turning them. That's why we commissioned the artwork on the cover of our book.

Bradley's point is valid. Illustrations of Joseph translating the plates without showing the Urim and Thummim contradict what Joseph and Oliver said just as much as Anthony Sweat's SITH illustration.

Then Bradley writes, "Scholarship offers a corrective to this faulty visualization. 4"

Instead of correcting any "faulty visualization," scholarship has compounded the problem, as we can see by consulting the references in Notes 3 and 4. One weakness of this article is the citations to these references without critical analysis.

(click to enlarge)

The documentary content of the Joseph Smith Papers is exceptional and world-class. It is better than any other comparable collection of papers I've seen.

However, there is a big problem with the explanatory notes, such as the "Seer Stone" entry in the Glossary that Bradley cited here. That entry and related notes are biased in favor of promoting the SITH narrative, as I discussed here:

https://www.ldshistoricalnarratives.com/2025/02/2025-improvements-jsp-on-urim-and.html

For another example, see

https://www.ldshistoricalnarratives.com/2023/08/u-in-elders-journal-outdated-narratives.html

Note 4 quotes the Wentworth letter ("Church History"), but then references From Darkness Unto Light, a highly problematic book that simply omits historical references that contradict its authors' theories and ignores fundamental problems with the SITH narrative.

https://www.ldshistoricalnarratives.com/2022/07/from-darkness-unto-light-omitting.html

Anthony Sweat's SITH illustration in that book compounds the problem of "faulty visualization" instead of fixing it. Let's look at it again.

Figure 1 enshrines the Mormonism Unvailed narrative by rejecting what Joseph and Oliver always said. It supports Royal Skousen's claim that Joseph and Oliver deliberately misled everyone about the translation, a claim that many other LDS scholars have embraced.

Figure 1 contradicts the entire point of this article--which hopefully is what was intended. 

If, as Sweat depicts, the plates were always covered, there was no reason for the messenger (Nephi) to bring the small plates to Fayette. There was no point in the Lord instructing Joseph to "translate the engravings which are on the plates of Nephi" (Doctrine and Covenants 10:41) because all Joseph had to do was keep reading what appeared on the stone-in-the-hat (SITH).

The problem with SITH has been summarized in a well-known meme:

I trust that readers will spot the juxtaposition of Sweat's SITH illustration and the two sets of plates, but sometimes images prevail over text, and that might be the case here.

I would have liked to see an illustration of what Joseph and Oliver taught, with Joseph translating the plates by means of the Urim and Thummim. That would enliven the Lord's instruction in D&C 10:41.

6. The Mary Whitmer illustration.

It was good to see a new illustration of the Mary Whitmer account instead of the more common one titled "Moroni shows the plates."

7. The map.

The map provided in the article is clear and useful, but a little misleading because it relates the old narrative. 

The annotation at Harmony says "Most of the Book of Mormon translated (April-May 1829)." To be more accurate, it should have said "The abridged plates translated (Nov 1828-May 1829)." Joseph related that he began to translate again after the plates were returned to him in Sept 1828 (after the 116 pages had been lost). David Whitmer said it took 8 months to translate (Nov 1828-Jun 1829). Documentary evidence indicates that Oliver was not the scribe for most or all of Mosiah. The annotation could also refer to the 116 pages being translated there, but that would complicate matters and that translation was also from the abridged plates anyway.

The annotation at Fayette says "Translation completed (June 1829)." To be more accurate, it should have read "Plates of Nephi translated (June 1829)." 

_____

Summary. This is an outstanding article that will hopefully generate more discussion and understanding among Latter-day Saints everywhere.

Hopefully it will lead to some corrections in the Saints book, the Joseph Smith Papers, and the works of other LDS scholars.

 

Unity through the 2 sets of plates and the end of M2C (and SITH)

Greg Matsen at the Cwic Show interviewed me about the two sets of plates article by Don Bradley in BYU Studies.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WExjn1MZt3k

During the interview, I said I thought Don's article will be the most unifying article BYU Studies has ever published. 

As more and more Latter-day Saints come to learn about the two sets of plates, many of them will discover for the first time that Joseph Smith and Oliver Cowdery answered the questions about the origin and setting of the Book of Mormon.

Origin. Understanding the two sets of plates will help all Latter-day Saints accept what Joseph and Oliver taught about the translation of the Book of Mormon. We can all read in the scriptures that the Lord told Joseph Smith "you shall translate the engravings which are on the plates of Nephi." (Doctrine and Covenants 10:41)

That commandment explains why Joseph needed to have the plates of Nephi. If Joseph wasn't actually translating the plates by means of the Urim and Thummim (as he and Oliver always said), and instead he was reading words that appeared on the stone in the hat (SITH), the Lord would have not needed to tell Joseph anything other than to keep reading what appeared on the stone.

For that matter, all of Section 10 would be superfluous. 

E.g.,  "Behold, I say unto you, that you shall not translate again those words which have gone forth out of your hands" (Doctrine and Covenants 10:30). if Joseph was not translating the engravings on the plates, there was no point in the Lord telling him not to translate them again. 

The stone would simply not have shown him words he wasn't supposed to translate.

Maybe, finally, Latter-day Saints can unify around what Joseph and Oliver said instead of what others claimed years later. Maybe we can all unite in rejecting the Mormonism Unvailed narrative about SITH, as well as Royal Skousen's assertion that Joseph and Oliver were "intentionally misleading" everyone when they wrote about the Urim and Thummim.

Setting. Understanding the two sets of plates will help all Latter-day Saints accept what Joseph and Oliver taught about the New York Cumorah/Ramah. Then we can all agree that theories about the setting that put Cumorah/Ramah elsewhere cannot, by definition, be correct.

Of course, that does not mean we know the locations of other Book of Mormon events. People have all kinds of theories about that, which makes sense because there are hundreds of possibilities and most relevant archaeological sites have been overbuilt and/or destroyed. 

But at least we have one "pin in the map" that will unify Latter-day Saints so we can move on from whatever disagreements have existed regarding Cumorah.

Good times for us all.

_____

People remind me often of the quotation attributed to Arthur Schopenhauer:

"All truth passes through three stages. First, it is ridiculed. Second, it is violently opposed. Third, it is accepted as being self-evident."

The quotation is actually a paraphrase of what Schopenhauer originally wrote.*

The psychology involved reflects a pattern of human resistance to paradigm-shifting ideas, often tied to psychological attachment to familiar beliefs.

The cognitive dissonance experienced by the M2Cers and SITH sayers will undoubtedly intensify, but that's not a long-term problem. 

New or revolutionary truths (important ideas, discoveries, or insights that challenge the status quo) typically go through three predictable phases in how society receives them:

Ridicule — At first, people mock or dismiss it as absurd, ridiculous, or laughable because it clashes with what everyone already believes or takes for granted.

Violent opposition — Next, as it starts gaining some traction, it faces strong, sometimes fierce resistance — emotional backlash, heated arguments, suppression, censorship and hostility — from those who feel threatened by the change it implies.

Acceptance as self-evident — Finally, once enough evidence accumulates and people get used to it, the idea becomes widely accepted as obvious or "common sense." People then wonder how anyone could have ever thought otherwise.

_____

Schopenhauer's observation also helps explain overall Christian reaction to the Restoration. Despite early ridicule and current opposition, more and more Christians are migrating toward the LDS positions on pre-mortal existence, the nature of the Godhead (3 distinct beings), the need for ordinances for the dead, etc.

_____

*While this exact phrasing is popularly attributed to Schopenhauer and appears on many quote sites, scholars have pointed out that his actual writing in The World as Will and Representation (1818/1819 preface) expresses a similar but not identical sentiment: 

truth gets only a brief moment of victory sandwiched between long periods of being condemned as paradoxical and then dismissed as trivial. 

The three-stage version with "ridiculed / violently opposed / self-evident" is apparently a later paraphrase or popularization rather than a direct quote.

Two sets of plates enters the mainstream

The most recent issue of BYU Studies includes an article by Don Bradley that introduces the concept of two separate sets of plates to a wide audience of Latter-day Saints.

You should read it if you haven't already.

https://byustudies.byu.edu/article/were-nephis-small-plates-contained-in-mormons-gold-plates

In coming posts, we'll discuss the article and its implications for M2C and SITH.

Excerpt:

Latter-day Saints have generally visualized the relationship of Mormon’s plates and Nephi’s small plates as two segments of a single record, bound together into one book by a shared set of rings. 

I will argue in this article that this visualization may also be faulty—that Mormon’s plates and Nephi’s small plates were not bound together into a single book but were utilized separately and sequentially by the Prophet Joseph Smith in translating the Book of Mormon. 

Evidence pointing to the model that the small plates and Mormon’s plates were separate records may be found in the Book of Mormon text and in sources from the early history of the Church.

Concluding note by Don:

Thank you so much to my dear sons Donnie and Nicholas Bradley for supporting and inspiring this work and for the love they have given across their lives. I also wish to acknowledge Jack Welch, John Thompson, Alex Criddle, and Jonathan Neville for their suggestions on this paper.

Scott Adams and M2C cognitive dissonance

In honor of Scott Adams, who passed away today, I'm posting this cartoon of his as adapted to the content of this blog.

It depicts our M2C scholars confronting Letter VII.

[cross posted at lettervii.com]