Defense of the Faith and the Saints. B. H. Roberts

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      I.

       The Manner of Translating the Book of Mormon.

       Table of Contents

FOREWORD.

       Table of Contents

      Of late years the manner in which the Book of Mormon was translated is a subject that has been much discussed. Through a misconception, as I think, in relation to the part taken in the work of translation by the Urim-Thummim, it is charged by anti-Mormon writers from first to last, that the verbal errors and errors in grammar which occur in the translation must be assigned to the Lord—a thing unthinkable. The popular understanding among the Latter-day Saints of the manner in which the translation was wrought out by means of Urim-Thummim has been such as to attribute the errors of the translation to equivalent errors in the Nephite original, which, it is held, were brought over literally and arbitrarily into the English translation—a thing most absurd. In view of these conditions the question arises, can such an explanation of the manner of translating the book be given as not to attribute either directly or indirectly these verbal and grammatical errors to the Lord, or to their existence in the original record from which the translation was made; and at the same time preserve as true and not inconsistent with reason, the statements that have been made, respecting the manner of the translation, by Martin Harris and David Whitmer, two of the Three Witnesses to the Book of Mormon. The writer is of the opinion that this may be done, and it is to such a task that the following papers are devoted.

      I am not unmindful of the fact that this subject is treated in the Young Men's Manuals of 1903–1906; but here the subject is more fully considered, and in a manner quite distinct since some of the papers are controversial and have a value quite apart from the mere affirmative treatment in the Manuals.

      I may be pardoned for urging these papers on the attention of the ministry of the Church, especially the foreign ministry, since I believe that the theory here advanced concerning the translation of the Nephite record is the only one at the same time tenable and in accordance with the statements made by those who, after the Prophet Joseph Smith, had the best opportunity of knowing in what manner Urim-Thummim aided in the marvelous work. The value of the Manual theory of translation will appear in the brief discussion on the Book of Mormon which appears in this series of papers.