Joseph Smith's Bible version

[Katzpur]

There are also no evidences linguistic-wise or in literature, other Joseph's claim in his BoM and his teaching.

How do you know? I had no idea you had done so much research. Tell me, what exactly brought you to that conclusion?

 

[gnostic]

For one thing, in the history of the ancient Israelites, they had never used hieroglyphs as their mode of writing. And the Mayan were the only one at that time to develop such writing systems.

Do you see any similarities between Mayan, Azetec or Incan writings matching the sort of Hebrew alphabetic scripts?

Do you serious think that Lamanites and Nephites would cease completely, to use Hebrew writing, even though they are living in the New World?

Hebrew is ingrained into their writing, and it is what them who they are. For them to not even use it in the New World, but adopt something so alien, would be considered astonishing, and very backward.

 

[Bishka]

For one thing, in the history of the ancient Israelites, they had never used hieroglyphs as their mode of writing. And the Mayan were the only one at that time to develop such writing systems.

Do you see any similarities between Mayan, Azetec or Incan writings matching the sort of Hebrew alphabetic scripts?

Do you serious think that Lamanites and Nephites would cease completely, to use Hebrew writing, even though they are living in the New World?

Hebrew is ingrained into their writing, and it is what them who they are. For them to not even use it in the New World, but adopt something so alien, would be considered astonishing, and very backward.

Well, it is astonishing, why wouldn't it be? *sigh* Your gnostic beliefs are just as astoshishing and backward to me and many others as you say ours is.

 

[Katzpur]

For one thing, in the history of the ancient Israelites, they had never used hieroglyphs as their mode of writing. And the Mayan were the only one at that time to develop such writing systems.

Do you see any similarities between Mayan, Azetec or Incan writings matching the sort of Hebrew alphabetic scripts?

Do you serious think that Lamanites and Nephites would cease completely, to use Hebrew writing, even though they are living in the New World?

Hebrew is ingrained into their writing, and it is what them who they are. For them to not even use it in the New World, but adopt something so alien, would be considered astonishing, and very backward.

I'm afraid you're wrong.

The spoken language of the Nephites was Hebrew, but they wrote using a modified Egyptian script. This practice is not at all uncommon. For example, Yiddish is basically a form of German, but it is routinely written using Hebrew characters. One excellent example of this practice is seen in the ancient illustration that bears a remarkable resemblance to the Book of Mormon. It is Papyrus Amherst 63, dating from the 2nd century B.C. It looks a lot like the "reformed Egyptian" the Book of Mormon was written in. It's a papyrus scroll containing Aramaic texts written in an Egyptian script. Part of the Papyrus Amberst 63 is a version of part of Psalm 20. As to why the Jews would have chosen to record something so sacred in the language of their pagan enemies, the Egyptians, is a mystery. Perhaps they did so for the same reason the Nephites did. It was simply a more concise way of writing.

I can provide additional examples if you want.
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[gnostic]

Excuse me, but you are comparing oranges with lemons.

Are you trying to tell me that the Israelites had dumped using Hebew alphabets, which had existed as early as the 10th century BC, which they had adopted/adapted from the Canaanite alphabets, to use something like Aramaic-Egyptian demotic, in a period before the Israelites had even adopted Aramaic?

Give me a break, Katzpur? Do serious expect me to take this one-off Papyrus Amherst 63 seriously, that happened to parallel to the Nephites in America?

You are just pushing for justification, without any serious evidence except the possible link. Sorry, but I want more than just Papyrus Amherst 63 to take this debate seriously.

 

[Bishka]

Give me a break, Katzpur? Do serious expect me to take this one-off Papyrus Amherst 63 seriously, that happened to parallel to the Nephites in America?
.

And do you seroiusly need pure scientific proof to believe something spiritual? Get over it.

 

[gnostic]

Well, it is astonishing, why wouldn't it be? *sigh* Your gnostic beliefs are just as astoshishing and backward to me and many others as you say ours is.

Well, it is backward.

The Egyptians went from hieroglyphs to hieratic to demotic, and during the Hellenistic period, changed the Greek alphabets to Coptics. Now why would the Nephites be silly enough to go backward from Hebrew/Aramaic scripting to demotic to hieroglyphs?

 

[Bishka]

Well, it is backward.

The Egyptians went from hieroglyphs to hieratic to demotic, and during the Hellenistic period, changed the Greek alphabets to Coptics. Now why would the Nephites be silly enough to go backward from Hebrew/Aramaic scripting to demotic to hieroglyphs?

Perhaps they didn't teach it correctly to their children, and the language and script they had deevolved. Why is that so hard to take in?

 

[gnostic]

And do you seroiusly need pure scientific proof to believe something spiritual? Get over it.

Some proofs would be great, becky, if you can find ones.

Blind faith on the other hand is no better than superstitions and accepting ghouls and goblins. Fairytales and folklore are fascinating, but a line must be drawn if I am to accept reality of religion, not fairies, angels and demons.

 

[Bishka]

Some proofs would be great, becky, if you can find ones.

Blind faith on the other hand is no better than superstitions and accepting ghouls and goblins. Fairytales and folklore are fascinating, but a line must be drawn if I am to accept reality of religion, not fairies, angels and demons.

Same to you. Yours is as blind as mine is. And before you go throwing stones, look and examine your own faith.

 

[gnostic]

Perhaps they didn't teach it correctly to their children, and the language and script they had deevolved. Why is that so hard to take in?

I can accept people changing their language from one to another, but there are absolutely no Hebrew scripts found whatsoever in the New World. I can accept the Israelites adopting Aramaic and then Koine Greek, but they didn't lose their written and spoken language as completely as LDS's claims the Nephites/Lamanites did.

How can I (or anyone else for that matter) reconcile that, if these Nephites/Lamanites are really descendants of Israelites, if there are no evidences found archaeologically in those sites?

Nothing disappear forever, let alone the written language. And the languages they did find is completely alien to what is found in the whole history of Israel.

We don't even know what sort of language is found in Joseph Smith's gold plates, since that's not available to us. So how can we compare the writing of Joseph's plates to that of Hebrew, Aramaic, Egyptian or Mayan writings. Without those plates, we can only speculate what they may be like.

 

[Bishka]

. Without those plates, we can only speculate what they may be like.

Exactly. Only speculate and not prove true or untrue.

 

[gnostic]

Same to you. Yours is as blind as mine is. And before you go throwing stones, look and examine your own faith.

Sorry, becky, but I'm faithless guy when it comes to religion.

I love history, legend and mythology, and I find religion fascinating too, but not to the point where I believe in them.

Look, becky.

I can accept Jesus' teaching on morals, love and compassion for other fellow men (and women), but miracles and the existence of God, angels and demons are something I don't see in my ordinary daily life (except in the scriptures and testimonies), make it difficult to accept with faith.

 

[Bishka]

I can accept Jesus' teaching on morals, love and compassion for other fellow men (and women), but miracles and the existence of God, angels and demons are something I don't see in my ordinary daily life (except in the scriptures and testimonies), make it difficult to accept with faith.

Well, then you must not be looking for those miracles, because I see them everywhere.

 

[gnostic]

Exactly. Only speculate and not prove true or untrue.

You know the saying of people being divided into two types, in regarding to glass of milk.

One would see that the glass is half-empty. (Me)
The other would see that glass is half-full. (You)

But tell me. Who is right?

Well, there is a third group, which most people would ignore. The babies would only see the milk. They don't fuss about it being half-empty or half-full. To them, milk is milk. They are the wisest of them all.

 

[gnostic]

Well, then you must not be looking for those miracles, because I see them everywhere.

I don't call it miracle. I'd just call it Nature. (Except, of course, man-made object or device).

Conception, birth, life and death is all part of natural order of things. I don't see God's hand (or Satan's hand, if there are Satanists) in this.

 

[gnostic]

I accept the merits of religion for its teaching on morals, love and compassion, and accept them to be good advice, but faith on miracles and divine existences, on the other hand, is a totally different cup of tea.

I can accept Jesus as a man and as a teacher/philosopher, but don't expect me to believe in the afterlife, such as resurrection.

Personally, I don't want an afterlife. When I die, I just want to rest in peace, literally, as in "cease to exist". If you want to chase after the afterlife, then I would never ask you to follow me. To me, a choice to choose is paramount.

So I don't object to your belief in miracles, but please respect my rights that nothing is so black-and-white as you make it out to believe.

 

[Bishka]

So I don't object to your belief in miracles, but please respect my rights that nothing is so black-and-white as you make it out to believe.

I do, but you don't seem to respect that I believe differntly and call my beliefs ridiculous and hard-to-believe.

Anywho, off topic. So I'm done discussing this.

 

[gnostic]

It is a debate forum, after all.

But yes, you are right that this is an off-topic.

It was only supposed to be about Bible, not the BoM, DNA, linguistics, etc. I had only started this thread as in query on Joseph Smith's translation of the Bible, but for some reasons, we got started on DNA.

If either my elder sister or brother-in-law heard this sort of debate is going on here, they would most likely disown me, because they are Mormons. I don't get into any sort of religious debates with friends and family-members, because I do respect their rights to follow whatever religion they may choose.

Look, I am truly sorry,:sorry1: if any of my comments had offended you. But in the heat of a debate, I supposed I got carry away. I did not intend to offend anyone, but my bluntness do often get me into trouble.

 

[Bishka]

It is a debate forum, after all.

But yes, you are right that this is an off-topic.

It was only supposed to be about Bible, not the BoM, DNA, linguistics, etc. I had only started this thread as in query on Joseph Smith's translation of the Bible, but for some reasons, we got started on DNA.

If either my elder sister or brother-in-law heard this sort of debate is going on here, they would most likely disown me, because they are Mormons. I don't get into any sort of religious debates with friends and family-members, because I do respect their rights to follow whatever religion they may choose.

Look, I am truly sorry,:sorry1: if any of my comments had offended you. But in the heat of a debate, I supposed I got carry away. I did not intend to offend anyone, but my bluntness do often get me into trouble.

Apology accepted.