The Book of Mormon.

It is probably an obvious place to start, but The Book of Mormon is so important to the Church and its members that I have no other way to begin this blog.

I’ve read The Book of Mormon numerous times, and in many different ways, either as I would any other book, as a book of scripture to study, as a place to find inspiration, as an aid to teaching righteous principles, and probably many others.

I would recommend anyone read it, but, and it’s a big but, when you first read it do so without any preconceptions. It is a book not take at face value, you will miss 99% of what it has to offer.

It is easy to dismiss The Book of Mormon, what with its strange phraseology, repetitive themes, and its mystical origins, as nothing more than the fertile imagination of Joseph Smith. The problem with that conclusion is it doesn’t stand up when you look deeper into everything else surrounding it. When The Book of Mormon was first published in 1830 there were a number of detractors in the following years pointing out so called anachronisms in the text and in the story of its translation – the idea of books being inscribed on metal plates, for example, was laughable in the 19^th Century, though now it has been proven that not only were books of scripture inscribed on metal plates, but the practise comes from the correct time period that The Book of Mormon claims to be from. Pretty much every other anachronistic objection has been seen to be not only not anachronistic, but also not objectionable.

There are many, many other points I could go into that critics have voiced over the years, but to do so would make this single post book length, if not the length of volumes of books. There will possibly be points about The Book of Mormon that I’ll address in subsequent posts as they arise, but for now I’ll leave this one here. What I would add is a plea from me to get your hands on a copy of The Book of Mormon, they are available for free from the Church, (the missionaries are more than welcome to hand them out to people), and read it. See the principles it teaches and apply them to your own life, there is nothing in it that will not improve your way of living.

If you have any questions about the criticisms of The Book of Mormon, the answers to pretty much all of them can be found at the Foundation for Apologetic Information and Research (FAIR): Fairlds.org

And if you want to know more about The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints go to Mormon.org.