serious mormon question?

Question

why is it that mormons believe that the bible is corrupt? is it because it has gone through the hands of people? because if so what protects the book of mormon from such corruptions? and if the book of mormons if so perfect then why has it had more than 10,000 correction, half of which are not grammatical? (,eaning that the whole meaning of the sentence has changed)

Answer 1

(1)The Book of Mormon has had somewhere around 3900-4000 changes made to it since it’s publication in 1830. Although most of these changes have been minor (such as spelling corrections and grammatical errors) there also have been alterations that alter the meaning of the text. For example:

1830 Version:1 Nephi 11:21
“And the angel said unto me, Behold the Lamb of God, yea, even the eternal Father”

Today’s Version

“And the angel said unto me: Behold the Lamb of God, yea even the son of the eternal Father”


Mosiah 21:28

“King Benjamin had a gift from God, where-by he could interpret such engravings”

“King Mosiah had a gift from God, where-by he could interpret such engravings”

(There are more alterations that also change the meaning of the text, however in an effort to shorten this I have left them out.)

Now according to David Whitmer, one of the three witnesses to the Book of Mormon, The Book of Mormon was translated as follows:
“I will now give you a description of the manner in which the Book of Mormon was translated. Joseph Smith would put the seer stone into a hat, and put his face in the hat, drawing it closely around his face to exclude the light; and in the darkness the spiritual light would shine. A piece of something resembling parchment would appear, and on that appeared the writing. One character at a time would appear, and under it was the interpretation in English. Brother Joseph would read off the English to Oliver Cowdery, who was his principle scribe, and when it was written down and reappeared to Brother Joseph to see if it was correct, then it would disappear, and another character with the interpretation would appear. Thus the Book of Mormon was translated by the gift and power of God, and nor by any power of man." (Address to All Believers in Christ, David Whitmer, 1887, page 12, reprinted 1960, Pacific Publishing Co., Martinez, CA.)

Martin Harris (Edward Stevenson's 1881 account):
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.

David Whitmer (Eri Mullin interview, 1874):
. . . the words would appear, and if he failed to spell the word right, it would stay till it was spelled right, then pass away; another come, and so on.


We can see by this that every word should have been spelled correctly. According to these witnesses each character was translated with the help of God through Joseph Smith. Each character is also said to be double checked. Now you could point out that there were different spellings back then, however this does not explain the grammatical errors or the addition or deletion of words. This should be impossible.
I will address the changes made to the Bible later but keep in mind, The bible was written (by men without the help of an angel) over 2000 years ago, and because of the perfection that the Book of Mormon claims it must be held to a higher standard.



(2)The Book of Mormon contains many plagiarisms that cannot be explained if it was written between 600 B.C. And A.D. 421
The Book of Mormon contains some 27,000 words directly from the King James Version, For example there are whole chapters that have been lifted from Isaiah. However the most interesting point is that the Book of Mormon copies not only the Old Testament, and some of the New Testament I believe, but it also copies errors in the King James Version (KJV) and italicized words that were inserted by the KJV translators. How is the possible?
Some examples of error which the Book of Mormon copies:
In 2 Nephi 14:5 (which is the same as Isaiah 4:5) the correct translation of the Hebrew "Chuppah" is "canopy" not "defense." Another example is in 2 Nephi 15:25 (which is the same as Isaiah 5:25). The correct translation of the Hebrew "cuwchah" is "filth," not "torn."

But my favorite has to be 1 Nephi 10:9 (John 1:28.)
If look in different translations and you will see that the KJV says "Bethabara", while virtually everything else says " Bethany." The "church father" Origen (c. 230 AD) changed the text from Bethany to Bethabara, honestly thinking that he was correcting an existing mistake, not making one. The original text of John absolutely, positively, read Bethany, and that is absolutely the name of the place where John was baptizing at that time. But the KJV translators didn't know about the textual question, and so the KJV reads Bethabara, as I indicated above. This means nothing in the big scheme of things, but in the case of the Book of Mormon it does, because if the Book of Mormon was of divine origin then the prophecy in 1 Nephi 10:9 about where the Christ would be baptized would have mentioned the proper place, even though in Smith's day it would have seemed wrong since the KJV said something else. But instead Smith copied the "prophecy" out of the KJV and so copied down the wrong place.

Answer 2

I’m not sure the word to use is corrupt, it’s not. We love the Bible and are studying it in Sunday school right now. The Bible does have some translation problems; if it didn’t there would not be so many different translations. 1 John 5:7 is a good example, it should not be there, it was added around 350 ad. Did you know there are three endings to Mark?

The Book of Mormon is not perfect when it comes to grammar; Joseph Smith was not an educated man. Also spelling and grammar were different back then. Most of the changes you mention are the forming of chapters and verses and thousands of cross references. Also headings were added to give a brief overview of the chapters. When the original papers were found they went in and corrected some typesetting errors which had crept in. There have been two or three doctrinal clarifications, didn’t change the meaning just made it clearer.

What is perfect are the doctrines of Christ which are taught within the pages of the Book of Mormon. Jesus is the Savior. His blood brought us salvation from sin and the resurrection; only through him can mankind return to their Father in Heaven.

Answer 3

I'll tell you a story, it's kinda scary so don't scream!
Once upon a time there wasn't any thing called Spell Check!!!
The Book of Mormon was printed in this time. They used a printing press which wasn't fool proof.

As for the Bible Being corrupt We believe that evil men tempted by Satan decided that parts of the Bible would cost them in some way and simply took it out.

The Book of Mormon was Written on Brass plates and later converted to Gold Plates by a righteous man who wouldn't dare go against God's will. Gold and Brass are a lot harder to edit then paper as the bible was written on. The Kings James Version is the closest version to the truth.

Answer 4

Yes, partly because the bible has been through many hands. Mormons aren't the only faith that believe you can't always take the bible word for word; I've been in more than one religious debate with a friend from another christian faith that has told me his church also teaches that parts of the bible are corrupt.
Are you not aware that there are more than one version of the bible? They can't all be right, they're translated differently. The LDS faith believes the King James Version to be the most correct, so that's what they teach from.
The Book of Mormon, for one, is much newer than the Bible. It was translated by Joseph Smith in the 1800s. The Bible dates over 2000 years old. Imgaine how many hands can get on a book for 2000 years, compared to 200 years. That alone explains it.
But, because the Book of Mormon is believed to be translated through Joseph Smith, directly through the power of God. Even the KJV of the Bible was translated through a group of people who voted on how each word would be translated.
As for these corrections you speak of, I'd have to say I've never heard of them. "Correction" doesn't prove anything false, as you seem to be aiming for. What would prove it false is if you were to say "He left this mistake", with proof that it was a mistake. "Correction" only means he fixed a mistake that was there, and assuming you're right in that there were that many corrections, I'd say they were corrected by God's command. As much as Joseph Smith has done for the sake of mankind, he was only human. And you know what? For a man who was under-educated, I'd have to say that 10,000 corrections isn't bad for a book that big.

Answer 5

Your point is well taken. However, Mormons get away with mass revision of their book the same that Christians always have: someone is declared blessed by god and uniquely inspired to interpret the scripture in the "correct" manner. Under the guise of revealed accuracy, many a revision will occur.

Answer 6

nothing stops the book of mormon from being corrupt. because the bible has some flaws in the translation, one must look at more than one translation and see which one is the one with truth. (but it is not so corrupt that one has to bring down it hollines and put in another book)

Answer 7

Well said Joshua K. Being that this is factual, how does the LDS Church explain such? They don't. They ignore it. Isn't religion wonderful?

Answer 8

Amen to Nancy and Trentman

Answer 9

it's caLLed faith

Answer 10

President Joseph Fielding Smith, Jr., wrote:
"We are all aware that there are errors in the Bible due to faulty translations and ignorance on the part of the translators, but the hand of the Lord has been over this volume of Scripture nevertheless, and it is remarkable that it has come down to us in the excellent condition in which we find it." (Doctrines of Salvation, 3:191)
There is no question that some parts of the text have been corrupted. Of the thousands of early Greek and Hebrews manuscripts and fragments that scholars have to work with, there are many small and some serious differences that make it impossible to propose one single, standard text that one might hope to be free from errors. In fact, Leon Vaganay and Christian-Bernard Amphoux, two non-LDS writers, say that there are over 5,000 Greek manuscripts or fragments to work with, containing roughly 250,000 variants among them. They say that "it would be difficult to find a sentence, even part of a sentence, for which the rendering is consistent in every single manuscript. That certainly gives plenty of food for thought." (Leon Vaganay and Christian-Bernard Amphoux, Initiation a la critique textuelle du Nouveau Testament [An Introduction to New Testament Textual Criticism], translated by J. Heimerdinger, New York: Cambridge University Press, 1991, p.2, as cited by Kerry A. Shirts, Journal of Mormon Apologetics, Vol. 1, 1999, p. 94.)
Some of the errors are obvious and can be found by an inspection of the Bible alone. Many such problems are discussed by Norman Geisler and Thomas Howe in their excellent book, When Critics Ask: A Popular Handbook on Bible Difficulties (Baker Books, Grand Rapids, Michigan, 1992). Though written from a faithful Protestant perspective to support the Bible, Geisler and Howe regularly acknowledge that some minor problems and contradictions are due to copyist errors. For example, 1 Kings 4:26 says Solomon had 40,000 stalls when 2 Chronicles 9:25 says he had 4,000. "This is undoubtedly a copyist error" (p. 181). That particular problem is one of many examples of problematic large numbers in the Hebrew text. In 1 Samuel 13:1, a word is missing in the Hebrew (Geisler and Howe, p. 159). The first phrase of that verse literally says that "Saul was the son of ... years when he became king." Translators must fill in the missing word with a numerical estimate, resulting in many contradictions among translations (NKJV gives "one year", NASB gives "forty", and the NIV gives "thirty"). A verse with a word missing shows that the Biblical text cannot be utterly infallible with no missing or corrupted elements. But this is only one of many problems.

Some problems may be minor errors due to translation problems, such as Leviticus 11:20, which speaks of "fowls that creep, going upon all four" (KJV - some other translations offer "insects" instead of "fowls," which makes more sense in the context but still seems biologically puzzling). Listing a bat as a "bird" and a hare as a cud chewer in Deut 14 (verses 7 and 18, respectively) also raises arguably trivial questions about biological accuracy (though it's even more serious than the apparent biological errors anti-Mormons mock in the Book of Mormon).

Further, there are many examples of contradictions within the Bible, though they are usually of minor or non-doctrinal importance, such as the numerical contradiction mentioned above. Other examples of contradictions include I Chron. 21:5 and 2 Samuel 24:9; 2 Sam. 10:8 and 1 Chron. 19:18; 2 Kings 24:8 and 2 Chron. 36:9; Ezra 2 and Nehemiah 7, and 2 Chron. 22:2 and 2 Kings 8:26. Some of these are so plain that even defenders of Biblical inerrancy must at least admit the likelihood of copyist errors (Norman Geisler and Thomas Howe, When Critics Ask: A Popular Handbook on Bible Difficulties, Baker Books, Grand Rapids, Michigan, 1992, p. 199, comparing 2 Kings 24:8 and 2 Chron. 36:9 where Jehoiachin's age when he began to reign is given as 18 and 8 years, respectively).

Some errors in the Biblical appear to be simple, easily understood accidents, such as Matthew misattributing a quote from Zechariah (Zech. 11:12-13) to Jeremiah in Matt. 27: 9-10. Others are harder to resolve, though generally still minor, such as the apparent contradiction between Mark 6:8, Luke 9:3, and Math. 10:10, where the staff is forbidden in Matthew and Luke but permitted in Mark's account of Jesus' instructions to his disciples.

Of slightly more significance are the differences in the three Biblical accounts of Paul's vision on the road to Damascus. These differences can be explained as due to slight errors in memory and should not detract from our acceptance in the Bible. But they do show that even great apostles are not infallible in all things, just as the Bible itself is not infallible in every little detail.

Paul relates his story three times in the Bible (Acts chapters 9, 22, and 26), and each time there appear to be differences, even contradictions. There are many details that differ between the three accounts. A well-known problem concerns the other witnesses who were with Paul. Look at the three accounts:

-- Acts 9:7 --
And the men which journeyed with him stood speechless, hearing a voice, but seeing no man.
-- Acts 22:9 --
And they that were with me saw indeed the light, and were afraid; but they heard not the voice of him that spake to me.

--Acts 26:14 --
And when we were all fallen to the earth, I heard a voice speaking unto me. . .

Did the others hear the voice or not? Did they fall or remain standing? (Does it really matter?) Anti-Mormon critics would revel in an apparent contradiction of this magnitude in the Book of Mormon or in the history of Joseph Smith, but they are quick to gloss over such problems in the Bible. I think we need to be generous with Paul and recognize that the peripheral details are not essential for his message. Perhaps the apparent contradictions just relate different aspects of a single story, with others who may have heard the voice and may have been standing initially, but then later fell and did not hear part of the message. Frankly, it looks like a minor contradiction, perhaps resulting from a lapse in memory concerning details of the event, but it does not bother me because I do not require the Bible to be infallible in minor details to still be scripture from God.
There are several more differences in the three accounts of Paul's vision worth noting. Some of the differences seem minor and easily compatible. For example, Acts 9 and 22 simply say the light that Paul saw appeared around him, while Acts 26 say the light was around him and those that were with him. All three agree that the Lord said, "Saul, Saul, why persecutest thou me?" and that Paul said, "Who art thou, Lord?". However, in Acts 9, the Lord says "It is hard for thee to kick against the pricks" before Paul responds, while Acts 26 has the Lord say that after Paul responds, and Acts 22 makes no mention of that statement from the Lord.

More analogous to the Joseph Smith First Vision accounts, the accounts in Acts 9 and 22 conclude by telling how Paul regained his sight and make no mention of statements from the Lord about Paul's future mission. Later, though, in Acts 26, Paul does not even mention his blindness and his miraculous recovery, but says instead that the Lord prophesied to him of his future mission among the Gentiles. If Paul were Joseph Smith, critics would accuse him of fabricating new twists to his story and contradicting himself, but I feel it's more fair to believe that both Paul and Joseph were relating different parts of their visionary experiences. Initially, Paul may have been most concerned about the healing of his eyes, while later his recollection of the Lord's words about his mission to the Gentiles became a more important part of the vision.

Anti-Christian critics in the early Christian era "also noted that a number of verses from the Hebrew Bible were incorrectly quoted in the New Testament. For example, they compared Deuteronomy 6:5 with Mark 12:30 and Luke 10:27. How could Jesus be the Messiah, the gainsayers asked, if Jesus and his disciples were ignorant of verses that even the youngest child would know?" (Darrick T. Evenson, The Gainsayers: A Converted Anti-Mormon Responds to Critics of the LDS Church," Horizon Publishers, Bountiful, Utah, 1989, pp. 43-44, citing Daniel J. Lasker, Jewish Philosophical Polemics Against Christianity in the Middle Ages, New York, KTAV, 1977, p. 5). Again, these minor problems do not detract from the divinity of the Bible's message, but should temper our expectations about the inerrancy of any record produced with human assistance.

There are also some examples of prophecies that don't seem to have been fulfilled in the expected or logical way. I discuss several of these on my LDSFAQ page, Questions about Prophets in Latter-day Saint Religion. One obvious example is the story of Jonah, who was told by God to prophecy to the people of Nineveh. Jonah prophesied that the people would be destroyed in 40 days (Jonah 3:4) - no loopholes were offered, just imminent doom. God changed things, however, when the people repented and He chose to spare them - much to the chagrin of that imperfect (yet still divinely called) prophet, Jonah. Jonah, in fact, was "displeased ... exceedingly" and "very angry" (Jonah 4:1) about this change from God, perhaps because it made Jonah look bad. In spite of an "incorrect" prophecy and in spite of the obvious shortcomings of Jonah, he was a prophet of God and the Book of Jonah in the Bible is part of the Word of God.

Another problematic prophecy is found in 2 Samuel 7:4-17, where Nathan the prophet tells David that his royal house and kingdom will "be established forever" (v. 16). No conditions are given. The Babylonian invasion later overthrew the throne of David and that kingdom, and it certainly is not in place today. However, we do find conditions in a related prophecy in I Kings 9, given when the Lord appeared to Solomon (v. 2 - one of many reminders that God does appear to some of His prophets, in spite of some anti-LDS claims to the contrary). The Lord told Solomon that He would "establish the throne of thy kingdom for ever, as I promised to David thy father" (v.5) - IF Solomon would walk in the ways of the Lord (v. 4). Solomon failed to follow the Lord and committed terrible sins. Soon the house of David lost the northern kingdom of Israel, and later the throne of David was overthrown. But what Nathan spoke in 2 Samuel 7 was not tempered with any explicit conditions and thus could be branded as an incorrect prophecy. Whatever the case, 2 Samuel 7 is problematic.

On the issue of problems with dates in the Bible, Kevin Hill sent e-mail with the following comments:

The dating/chronology problems in the Bible are legion. Just check out a good Bible Dictionary under the article "Chronology." A few examples:
The ages of the Patriarchs upon their successors' births (and in some cases their ages at death) vary wildly among the Masoretic Text, the Samaritan Pentateuch and the Septuagint. Which are correct?
The Masoretic Text has 720 years from Abraham's birth to the Exodus; the Septuagint and Samaritan Pentateuch have 505 years. Again, which is correct? Why the discrepancy if the Bible is perfect?
The Septuagint has 10 fewer years from the Exodus to the founding of Solomon's temple (as compared to the Masoretic Text). Where did they go?
There are numerous instances where the biblical data does not match the testimony of Assyrian and Babylonian records, and for various reasons scholars have a high degree of confidence in those secular records.
Luke at 2:2 mentions that Jesus was born at the time of a census when one Quirinius was governor of Syria. We know from Roman records that P. Sulpicius Quirinius conducted an assessment in 6-7 C.E. [far too late to be Luke's census] while governor of Syria; he was not governor during Herod's reign. There have been various attempts to resolve this problem.
(As an aside, some of our Bible-believing critics who get bent out of shape over apparent quirks in the chronology given by Joseph Smith in his writings ought to be careful about making too much of such problems unless they are prepared to fully resolve the problems with chronology in the Bible.)
Another example discussed on my page about Prophets in Latter-day Saint Religion is the case of Tyre and Ezekiel's prophecy of its destruction. I don't think that the problems with this prophecy can be refuted. This small example of a clear difficulty doesn't mean that the Bible is false at all - but that we must understand that it must be interpreted with caution and an open mind, and that it is not strictly inerrant. The only truly inerrant authority is God - that's why continuing revelation through His apostles and prophets is so important for His Church (the true, restored Church of Jesus Christ).

Finally, some people expect the Bible to be not only an infallible guide to faith, but an infallible guide to science as well. They will be disappointed to find (minor) technical "errors" that challenge such assumptions. The PUZZLING description of "fowls that creep upon all four" in Leviticus 11:20 has already been mentioned. Also, in Joshua 10:12-13, when daylight hours were miraculously extended for a battle, we read that "the sun stood still, and the moon stayed" - as if the sun goes around the earth. (This may have been an accurate description of what was observed, but it doesn't make good science for those who expect every statement to be scientifically precise.)

Don't Be Quick to Condemn!

In dealing with the Bible as well as any other scripture, we must strive to consider how apparent conflicts might be harmonized and avoid the tendency to criticize and reject truth out of our own ignorance. We must have an open-minded willingness to look past minor problems in order to understand the priceless message of the Word. This faithful approach to scripture is well illustrated in Laurence E. Porter's discussion of the differences between the Gospels of Mark and Luke in their relation of events at the empty tomb of Christ, differences which some see as further examples of (minor) contradictions in the Bible ("Luke," in The International Bible Commentary, ed. F.F. Bruce, Zondervan Publ. House, Grand Rapids, Michigan, 1986, p. 1226):

Luke's story is in general outline very much like Mark's, but there are considerable differences in detail.
(a) Mark has one young man at the sepulchre, Luke has "two men". (Matthew incidentally has an angel, John has two angels.) These are not necessarily contradictions. The "clothes that gleamed like lightning" of Luke suggests supernatural beings (cf. 9: 29). The difference between one angel or two may be due to nothing more than the fact that two were present, but that one only engaged in speech. At all events, the descriptions that we have are expressions in human words of a phenomenon that far transcended human experience.

But the truth of the story of the empty tomb does not depend on our ability to devise a satisfactory scheme of harmonization, but in the tremendous effect that the event had on the disciples, and on subsequent history.

(b) The lists of women's names in the two Gospels are slightly different. But neither of them is necessarily complete.

(c) Luke omits the message reported by Mark that Peter and the disciples are to meet Jesus in Galilee. The post-resurrection appearances recorded by Luke are all in Judea, but the disciples are reminded of teaching He gave them in Galilee.

(d) In Mark, the women were so startled by the events at the tomb that they found themselves unable to give the message to the disciples. In Luke on the other hand, they go and report to the disciples all that has happened, though of course there is no message of a rendezvous in Galilee for them to convey.

The fact of the resurrection is one of the best historically attested facts of ancient history. For a clear and concise survey of the evidence, see J. N. D. Anderson, The Evidence for the Resurrection (London, I950).

Porter refuses to stumble over minor apparent difficulties and seeks to understand how they might be resolved. That approach is needed by any Christian to benefit from the Bible.
Those who put their faith in a perfect, complete Bible worship a fictional idol, not the living God. I really worry about those who have this belief, for they will become disillusioned once they do a little serious study. They might give up on God altogether once the former object of their worship proves to be incomplete and imperfect, at least as imperfect as human language and much more so due to obvious glitches in the text.

I recently received this message:

"If [the Bible] really is the Word of God, then it most surely is perfect, complete, and true because God is perfect, complete, and true. In other words, there is no inbetween - if God is perfect, so is His word."
I asked this person if there was any biblical basis for his assumption. It is an entirely human assumption that every tiny aspect of a text must be perfect for it to come from God. On the face of it, though, since human language is obviously imperfect, no text in human language can be transcendently perfect and complete, but that doesn't mean the text did not originate from a perfect Being. Now apart from the limitations of language, if a sentence or two in the book of Amos is garbled, for example - as several sentences most assuredly are, or if a few words are missing in some parts of the Old Testament such that translators just have to guess at the meaning (clearly the case), how does that detract from the value of what has been preserved? It's only a problem if one assumes that the text is the final authority - in other words, that the text IS God and thus must be perfect to be worthy of worship. Such an object of worship will not withstand much scrutiny. Please don't worship the text - worship the living God.
Conclusion: The Bible is true, in spite of some minor problems. It is not infallible and inerrant, but true and divinely inspired, though it required the work of human hands to produce it.