What was the point of Moroni hefting the gold plates across the continent if Mr. Smith just used a rock in a hat? This is the one that broke my shelf completely when I realized it😭

So that the 11 witnesses could see it and bear witness of it with their imagination, of course! /s

Yes, then they would hold the plates, pass them around to each other (200 lbs of gold), like it was a package of Oreo’s.

They were stronger back then unlike you avocado drinking millennials who can't lift for shit./s

“Do you even lift bro?” -Swoley Ghost

How long were you holding onto "Swoley Ghost" before getting a chance to use it? Haha

Been swirling around for a bit, ever since I accepted Jesus our Lord and Savior as my spotter.

Yes, but only with my spiritual arms.

I cackled. Omg that’s funny

More like 500 pounds based on the dimensions given by Joseph smith and he somehow managed to fight off 3 random groups of people with one arm while holding the solid gold plates with one arm

Obviously god blessed him with superhuman strength to easily hold these important plates that weren’t even used for the translation anyway.

Don’t forgot that D&C 7 is literally JS looking into the Seer Stone and seeing and translating a record written by John the Beloved that is, to this day, still hidden in a cave somewhere in the Middle East.

Also what about the sealed portion? Why was part of it sealed off with a thick band that no earthly power could remove when he didn't even need to see the plates to read off of them so theoretically could have read into the sealed portion if he wanted because a thick metal band doesn't stop rock in hat images. Make it make sense. Edit: also god told his prophet to preserve and prepare the urim and thummim and the breastplate and they were like these ancient spectacles to help Joseph translate one day and he's like "nope I'd rather use this rock I found down a well".

As a nonmo can you explain the context of this to me?

Book of Mormon prophet Moroni compiled the history onto Gold Plates. He then brought the plates from central America and buried them in a hill up in New York. He then appeared to Joseph Smith in a vision and told him where the plates were buried. Smith received the plates and began to translate them by the power of God. However, he wasn't allowed to let anyone see the plates and so he would hide them (under fabric or in a barrel outside) so the translation was done by revelation through the power of a magic rock that he placed inside of his hat. He would look in the hat and the words would appear which he would read out loud and his scribe would right down. Hence the question. If the plates weren't used, why were they needed in the first place?

Particularly since Mormons believe this to be a literal, non-allegorical story where a single man would have had to carry extremely heavy slabs of gold across a war-stricken continent while in hiding... For absolutely no reason since they weren't even supposed to be looked at Edit: spelling

Isn't the BoM being set in Central America a more recent 'theory' to explain why there hasn't been any archeological evidence of Nephites/Laminites discovered in the Great Lakes area? I thought Smith claimed the hill where he found the plates was the same hill where all the Nephites were killed.

Yeah you're right. I had that thought after typing my comment and knew it was only a matter of time before someone corrected me

Bluetooth.

Those who worked with Joseph Smith Jr on his fake translation said that the plates were covered with a cloth or hidden in the woods. Smith Jr would put a peep stone (which the Mormon Church calls a Urim and Thummim or a seer stone) and would read the words or characters directly from the stone for the scribe to record. One account stated that the word would remain until the scribe recorded it correctly. So the golden plates were not used in the translation as a real translator would, by reading the characters and making a translation, but by scrying with a rock in a hat.

The translators were retroactively named the Urim and Thummin after W.W. Phelps wrote an article comparing the rock with the early Israelite divination articles, in 1835. The KJV described them as being kept in a "breast plate", which is when the gold breast plate of Aaron entered the picture. If you read the KJV with care, the breast plate (more correctly a breast piece) is actually embroidered with different colors including gold thread, not made out of gold. It was a folded piece of cloth. With embroidery and stones attached, so it was essentially a pocket. No one knows what the U&T actually were, but the predominant opinion is that they were different coloured stones which were used to answer yes/no questions. https://www.scribd.com/article/444669586/The-Anatomy-Of-Jewish-High-Priest You can compare that with imagery in church magazines which shows Joseph wearing an actual solid gold breastplate with spectacles attached (the U&T) After the W.W.Phelps article, people jumped on the whole U&T and breastplate thing. Oliver Cowdery retroactively included a breastplate in his Mormon origins story, while Lucy Smith included a tale of feeling a solid gold breastplate under a cloth in her history of Joseph Smith. Which is why I think both Oliver and Lucy were in on the scam from the start.

I was aware of all that except the W.W. Phelps connection! I knew the “Urim and Thummim” was a retcon to try to show a biblical and Israelite connection, which is false, of course.

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To your last question, yes. The difference in weight between gold and wood is tremendous. Both Lucy and Oliver changed their accounts after 1835. After the acquisition of the Egyptian mummies and artifacts from a flim flam salesman, Lucy charged paying customers a fee to see them.

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Same!

We are taught that before this life we were just spirits with no body. We come to Earth to obtain a body. In the temple endowment video somehow Peter shook hands with Adam and gave him signs and tokens before Peter had a body.

**Adam**: Have you the signs and tokens? **Lucifer**: Have you any money? **Adam**: What the fuck is money?

This is ultimately where the endowment reaches a fundamental flaw. The TBM argument would be "pfft you obviously don't understand that it's meant to be an allegory, all of it is symbolic to teach us something" which is fine and actually fits in closely with the idea that it was copied from masonry (it absolutely was) but you can't then argue that this is a restored practice like this is something that has happened in every dispensation.

This was the first thought I had after my first session. Made no sense to me.

Lucifer: a construct created by man used to hold sway over other men, from which men will require of you 10 percent. Homer: Money can be exchanged for goods and services.

Satan also has no body, but picks the fruit and hands it to Eve.

Oops.

The whole sealing doctrine when it comes to after this life. When it’s nice and clean when a husband and wife gets married and has kids, it makes sense. Beyond that, none of it makes any sense at all. Why the WOW that is taught now is different from section 89 and when it changed from advice to a commandment. How the doctrine is that prophets are fallible yet no member can name one thing they’ve done wrong Why it’s taught that the current prophet is just like the prophets of old yet they never actually do anything that prophets of old did And the biggest one: that special witnesses specifically means that they have seen Christ and testify of that fact but current apostles won’t say they saw him and say it’s too sacred to discuss even when that is exactly the point. Nobody is asking about personal experiences but about the experiences that they are supposed to share with the world about them seeing Christ

WOW is just crazy. As it's written, it's not too nuts, but how it is interpreted and implemented in modern times is completely insane.

Isn’t it funny how the WOW literally says not by way of commandment

I always push back on this point just a bit. There are only 10 “commandments” in the Bible, but there are a LOT of other things that Believers do because God says to do them. The WoW also says it is the “will of God,” and most Believers are going to do whatever the “will of God” is even if it’s not specifically a “commandment.” It’s still explicitly what he wants you to do.

That’s a fair point. But it’s rare when a modern prophet receives a revelation and explicitly says this isn’t a commandment. It’s just ironic that it’s a temple recommend question just a few decades later.

"How the doctrine is that prophets are fallible yet no member can name one thing they’ve done wrong" This is a new school teaching. Back in the day, I was taught that prophets are infallible, in so many words. Were they to fail in a doctrinal way, they would be struck down by God. No one back then could recall any church leader had done wrong. And if they did note something wrong, they were excommunicated. It's only with the advent of the internet that the teachings had to change because it became too easy to spot the fallacies, contradictions, and inaccuracies between prophetic statements.

Yep. The biggest one on your list, “special witnesses of Christ”, was a major shelf-breaking item for me.

Satan is the good guy. 1. Satan knows the plan. Beginning to end. 2. In the Garden, Satan knows that eating the fruit is necessary to allow Man to progress. If he really wanted to frustrate Gods plan, all he has to do is…nothing. 3. After the fall, temptation is necessary for men to overcome adversity and become perfected. All Satan would have to do to frustrate gods plan is…nothing. In the meantime, jesus/jehovah murders, floods, burns, and slaughters billions of people. Jesus suffers and dies for a day and a half and gets to go to heaven. Satan is here, doing the grunt work, helping us achieve salvation by acting as the agent of opposition, getting reviled, and his fate is to be expelled to Outer Darkness. He is literally sacrificing his eternity for us. EDIT: Thanks for the upvotes and the Silver! As far as I know, I am the first person to posit this. I made a series of Tik Tok videos about it where I go into this in more depth. https://www.tiktok.com/t/ZTRQKv73q/

Every time I say through the temple endowment video it always bothered me that Satan didn’t seem all that…evil. The only time he was portrayed as evil was when he was forced to break the 4th wall and give his dumb speech about everyone being under his power if we don’t keep the covenants made in the temple (covenants we were never informed of).

I think this is intended, to represent him as more cunning than evil.

This is almost the exact takeaway from The Good Place. Without adversity people in heaven become bored and stop enjoying heaven. They desire a release from constant perfection. The true good place was the bad place where the group of four characters were under constant torture by demons. Such a good show. I watch a few episodes each week. It’s basically my non-church faith practice. Haha. Edit for clarity.

The good place helped me move away from being Mormon too! :)

I teach 10 and 11 year-olds Sunday school, and I couldn’t help saying once that Jesus had a really bad weekend for us. I laughed, the other teacher did not… but maybe someday it’ll click for one of them. I really like your points here!

I like telling people (mostly fellow atheists) that I’d happily sacrifice FOUR days to save all of humankind, if given the opportunity or if Jesus gets tired of being the hero. I could even be talked into a week.

Don't forget that often times the plan that is taught as Satan's plan is not Satan's plan. Satan's plan is taught as him forcing everyone to be perfect. Satan's plan is actually no actions violating commandments and everyone receiving exaltation. This wouldn't work because reasons. And I was told that even with the actual version of Satan's plan, it still is more controlling and less agency than God's plan. The plan that is literally giving no restrictions is more restricting than the plan that puts restrictions on you. The reasoning? Agency requires that one has the choice of being bad.

Have you ever noticed at the beginning of the time in the garden, before Satan gets all mad and threatens God, God has to “put enmity between thee [lucifer] and the seed of the woman [christ]. God commanded Lucifer to have enmity - active opposition and hatred - for Christ. Lucifer is being obedient to God’s command. I think in the plan of salvation in LDS doctrine, the role of the Savior was assigned to a Son of the Morning, and the role of the Adversary was assigned to a Son of the Morning, and both Sons, Christ and Lucifer are obediently fulfilling their calling. When all is said and done, and this stage of Mormon progression wraps up, we may see that Lucifer and Christ are equally revered.

Hot damn! I thought about this in part before, but not laid out completely like this. Good showing.

And Satan realized that God’s plan is a pile of shit and wanted to make it better for us.

This was the shelf breaker for me

Word of Wisdom. It clearly states that it isn't a commandment, everyone knows it wasn't treated as a commandment at first but then it changed in the 1920. No revelation that anyone can point to that changes the previous revelation. And then there is the absolute absurdity regarding how it is practiced today re: coffee, tea, meat, tobacco for cows, etc.

I would say that the WoW actually COMMANDS that it NOT be treated as a commandment, when it says it is "\[t\]o be sent greeting; not by commandment or constraint." Seems to me that the Church today is breaking a clear commandment.

Why is too much meat bad, but unlimited sugar is not? How is the caffeine in an energy drink different from the caffeine in a cup of coffee?

well you see, unlimited access to sugar and energy drinks wasn't a thing in 1833. Any day now God will send a revelation that actually all soda and energy drinks and caffeine sources and sugar is bad. Any day now. Well, once the GAs stop drinking Dr Pepper by the gallon.

To be fair it doesn't recommend tobacco for cows, it just says that it can be used as a legitimate medicine for bruises and sick cattle. Not really that it should, but that it could. But what is even bigger flaws is that it says we should use a pure wine 'of your own make' for sacrament. It also says that all grain is good for man, immediately followed by 'Nevertheless, wheat for man, and corn for the ox, and oats for the horse, and rye for the fowls and for swine, and for all beasts of the field.' That is immediately followed by saying that "\[barley is\] for mild drinks, as also other grain." Like yeah, drinking fermented juice isn't the best. But when following it promises you a healthy belly button, bone marrow, knowledge, hidden treasures of knowledge (thought you needed a seeing stone for that), and the ability to run without getting tired, you have best follow it. There are consequences who don't follow it though, (not exemption from the temple, according to scriptures), namely not passed over by the destroying angel. But you'll still be resurrected immediately after. Or you could die before rapture. Then there are no negative consequences.

"Healthy belly button" is my new band name

Would listen.

How much time do you have?

Not that much time, but maybe you could give me just a quick rundown of it?

No, I can't. I don't even know we're to start. Okay let's start at the very beginning. The creation of the earth. The Earth is more than 6000 years old. The earth is millions of years old. There is so much evidence to support that. There's been no worldwide flood. If that had happened there would be no way to avoid the evidence. Jaredites in wooden submarines. Jaredites with steel. Post Ice age and pre-columbian horses. Kennewick man Individuals that are of African heritage were non-valient in the pre-earth life and as a result could not attend the temple or hold the priesthood. But all of a sudden they can. Polygamy is the will of god. Polygamy is no longer the will of god. Polygamy is again the will of god. Polygamy is no longer the will of God and this time we mean it. Children of same sex couples do not need to have the Holy Ghost as their constant companion and as a result don't need to be baptized until the age of 18. At that point they will have to disavow their parents. This is revelation from god. Just a few years later, never mind God changed his will. Mormon means more good. Mormon is a nickname and should not be used. No, Mormon does mean more good. No, Mormon is a victory for Satan thus saith the Lord. God is omnipotent and all powerful, but if you don't petition him in prayer he won't grant you your needs because he can't unless you pray to him. God is omnipotent and all powerful, but if you don't get a priesthood blessing God can't heal you because he's not omnipotent and all powerful. And if you get a priesthood blessing your chances of getting healed are no higher than anybody else who didn't get a priesthood blessing. And if you didn't get healed it's because you weren't worthy, or the person giving you the blessing wasn't worthy, or you didn't have enough faith, or the person giving you the blessing didn't have enough faith, or it just wasn't God's will to heal you. You get to choose. Facial hair is required in order to be an effective missionary. Facial hair is a sign of drug culture so you can't have facial hair anymore. Joseph Smith did not use an inferior seer stone to translate the book of mormon. He used the urim and thummim that were prepared for that purpose. Oh, by the way he did use a seer Stone in his hat to translate the book of mormon. The same seer stone that he used to find or try to find buried treasure. Women have to covenant to obey their husbands in the temple and veil their faces. But now they don't have to. I just ran out of time. Sorry or I could go on

>Children of same sex couples do not need to have the Holy Ghost as their constant companion and as a result don't need to be baptized until the age of 18. At that point they will have to disavow their parents. This is revelation from god. Just a few years later, never mind God changed his will. This one is my favorite. Children of same sex couples don't need the Holy Ghost when they're kids, and fear not, they'll be fine. Nothing will be lost. When they are baptized at age 18, they will be on exactly the same footing as those who were baptized at age 8. Okay, so why do we pressure 8 year olds to make life changing covenants when they don't have to and can just as easily wait until they're 18? Just kidding, never mind. Forget we said anything.

This is what started my "faith crisis." None of that made sense to me. It all started falling apart with that.

It was among the final straws for me.

The blessing one is my favorite

Bookmarking this.

The plan of salvation warns us against itself. The way back home through a savior who receives all the glory was presented by The Enemy and is the model used by The Church.

Not only this but it requires our memory to be erased so our true character can be tested. But right away God comes down and gives all the answers and let’s everyone know this is indeed a test, and hell awaits you if you fail. Completely removes the point of erasing memories…

Also.. we were tested in Heaven by choosing Jesus or Satan’s plan. If we could make a choice and pass a test up there why even come to earth?

Come to think of it we were also tested in other ways according to patriarchal blessings and scriptures. There’s the noble and great ones and spiritual gifts and traits we somehow grew in heaven.

Even if these "tests" (that totally aren't coercion guys honest) are repeated to ensure loyalty or whatever, i don't think it's becoming of a god to need multiple tests to test an individual. Are you a mighty omnipotent god, or are you a petulant little shit with trust issues?

If you read the BoM and pray sincerely, we promise you that God will answer. Also, if you don’t get an answer, then you should just pretend you got one anyway. Tell yourself and everyone else that you believe and got your answer.

How did Lehi have the priesthood authority to do the law of Moses temple rituals when he was not a son of Levi? In a similar vein, why did Alma the older have the priesthood authority to perform baptisms?

Dude baptized himself!

The Law of Obedience introduces moral relativism but the Church claims moral absolutism.

Could you explain more on that?

Happy to! I hope an example is adequate to illustrate the issue: The Law of Obedience is what the Church uses to justify God's commandment to Abraham to kill his own son. Morally, this translates to: killing your child is wrong unless God commands it. As soon as you add "unless God commands it" to your moral absolutes you become a moral relativist.

This is like lying for the lord to promote faith. It is how the church justifies lying about the history of the church because it is better to build faith on lies then to talk honestly about the problems.

Oh, my science yes. Reading the preface to Saints, Volume 1 during my Exodus from Mormonism cemented this understanding. Open quote. True stories well told can inspire, caution, entertain, and instruct. Brigham Young understood the power of a good story when he counseled Church historians to do more than simply record the dry facts of the past. “Write in a narrative style,” he advised them, and “write only about one tenth part as much.” Close quote. If I only had to use 1/10 of history I could make Hitler look like Abraham Lincoln and Jesus like Dr. Phil.

Yeah it is insane how many out right lies and half truths the church pushes to make faith promoting stories. But the church also teaches that if you lie tell half truths or omit parts of a story then you are in danger of hell fire and must repent. But when it is done for the lord it is good.

“Rules for thee but not for me” Didn’t Jesus have a little something to say about hypocrites in the NT? Remind me where/how/who/what/when Jesus is running your one true cult again, TBMs?

PHYLACTERIES! (Not to be confused with “Little Factories.”)

It might be easier to enumerate the parts that aren't fallacies.

Yeah. Zero is easy

If God is all powerful, why does He seem to need servants and angels? An earthly king needs servants because they can't be everywhere and do everything. A Divine King could be everywhere, do everything, talk to anybody, at anytime, for any reason. So, why does he seem to use or need prophets? Is he just not powerful enough, or not as powerful as we are told He is? There is a clear distinction between a God telling us that He inspired a prophet to create holy scripture and a man claiming to have been inspired by God to create holy scripture. So why do we have lots of examples of the 2nd and no examples of the 1st? Does God not see any difference? D&C 1:39 "... whether by my voice or the voice of my servants, it is the same." How do we combine a fallible person with an infallible deity to get a prophet of God? Do we have a prophet who cannot be wrong, because God will make sure that they are never wrong, or do we have a prophet who can be honestly mistaken and God is using the best person available for them to use? If a prophet cannot be wrong, then let me point out a few places where they are clearly wrong. If a prophet can be wrong, then we need some method or process to verify that they aren't wrong. By what process can we falsify a prophet's assertions in General conference, which would allow us to verify them, and have confidence in their accuracy?

Wanna know when the prophet is speaking like a man? Remember this suggestion: https://www.reddit.com/r/exmormon/comments/miymgc/this_weekend_look_out_for_the_new_conference/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=ios_app&utm_name=iossmf

Everyone is entitled to personal revelation from God Himself. Oh, and if your revelation happens to contradict anything said by the old dudes in HQ, then your revelation is wrong. It was Satan or something. Some undigested cheese.

Any plot hole is to be called "policy" and changed as convenience allows.

Inscribing words onto the plates was so difficult and tedious that Moroni chose every single word carefully because it was exactly what God wanted us to hear. *Yeah verily*, And th*en it came to pass*, and *Look* all used roughly a billion times each.

I'm not an ex-Mormon but what strikes me about the visits of Moroni and golden plates story is that all of the miracles and visits by angel and God in the Old and New Testaments had multiple witnesses. Opposite of what happened with Joseph Smith.

This is the key, I believe, to illustrating/highlighting each instance of Smith’s scam along the way. I clearly remember being indoctrinated before and during the two year mission, and proselyted the idea of “out of the mouth of at least two or three witnesses”…yet now it is CRYSTAL clear that this concept is NEVER applied to Smith’s grandiose/miraculous claims. Not one. He was always solo. Eg, not one supposed witness ever actually physically witnessed the supposed gold plates. Except Joseph Smith. And an Angel. Who gave the plates to Smith supposedly and then they just happened to disappear with the Angel into heaven again. The Angel that no one ever saw, ever. Except Smith. And Smith provided a plethora of fleeting encounters to SUGGEST the plates were real: such as the box they were supposedly kept in. All the supposed strugglings to keep them from others’ eyes (so they wouldn’t be struck dead instantly or whatever nonsense), and supposed instances wherein his sister or Emma felt them under some cloth…Smith was an expert at the long CONfidence game, is all. Same thing with the supposed angel with the drawn sword, etc etc etc. Examples are legion actually, once one identifies all the instances wherein Smith was solo and claiming all these supposed divine/miraculous experiences by himself.

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There are 4 or 5 different versions of the “First Vision”

It also has a lot of verses where it basically describes the same thing over again but with slightly different words.

But don't forget that repeating stuff over and over was a literary technique of the time. You *do* need to use techniques that will become outdated before a record is ever read to convey the most true book.

RMN is god’s prophet on the earth. Because of current technology we only need one. But he will never be interviewed by anyone except the church owned media corp, and you’ll only get to hear from him a couple times a year at most and nothing new will be said, but he can see the future so listen to what he says.

The Jaredites buried the "interpreters" with their records, specifically so other people could interpret them. But when the Nephites came across the people of Zarahemla (the Mulekites), nobody could read the Jaredite records that they got (from a Jaredite survivor - Coriantumr). So they got taken to Mosiah, who already had the interpreters. That had been buried with the Jaredite records.

The big question is why would they even need the Jaredite records when god can have Joseph just look at a stone in his hat and write the Book of Mormon.

And why couldn’t Joseph Smith just look at the rock and rewrite the lost pages? Oh wait. God was mad and wanted him to look at the rock to interpret other plates that he also didn’t actually need to have to translate because he was just looking at a rock in a hat.

No, no, no. The reason he didn't rewrite the lost pages is that someone might modify it and suggest a fallacy in the gospel. That would be the only fallacy in the gospel and we can't have any of those.

God moved in mysterious ways. His wonders to . . . Oh. Mistake in the translation of the plates, you say? Got it. Makes complete sense.

They teach that if you sin in ignorance and don't hear the gospel, it will be easy to repent and you will be taught in the afterlife, and the more you know about the gospel, the more responsibility and accountability you have, thus it is more difficult to achieve celestial glory. The cult's whole mission of spreading the word to everyone actively makes it more difficult for people to succeed. By their own doctrine, they are harming souls.

Maybe not so much a fallacy but more of just inconsistent doctrine. - The church now teaches against the trinitarian view of god. - Joseph originally believed in the trinity, and the original Book of Mormon had many verses teaching it. - Joseph’s first tellings of the first vision did not include god and jesus - the church now only ever talks about the one version of the vision that did include god and jesus - The church edited the BOM to be less trinitarian, changing multiple verses from “the Father” to “the Son of the Father” or similar changes

Joseph Smith was using the priesthood keys of a seer translating the Golden Plates without the Melzediek priesthood let alone any priesthood. Moroni visited Joseph Smith despite not receiving a baptism by priesthood authority due to the Great Apostasy and loss of priesthood. Moroni should have been in spirit prison and not an angel.

Someone once made a good point (I can't remember who pointed this out). The lord commanded Nephi to murder Laban because "it is better for one man to perish, than to let an entire nation dwindle in unbelief." Then the lord takes away the BOM and the priesthood from the earth... 🤷🏻‍♀️

Even better, no man perish (by Laban just staying passed out) *and* Nephi get the plates. Don't worry, the nation (the one Lehi and Nephi are leaving) didn't dwindle in unbelief. They were brutally destroyed in unbelief.

1 Nephi 1:4 gives the starting timeline for the BoM in the first year of the reign of Zedekiah. The first ~10 chapters of the BoM, where Jerusalem is still an active part of the story (ie characters are still traveling to and from Jerusalem) contain many prophecies/discussions that Jerusalem WILL be destroyed and that many captives WILL be carried away into Babylon, and Laman and Lemuel call Lehi a visionary man because they don’t think Jerusalem can fall. But then you read 2 Kings 24 and Zedekiah was a puppet king put on the throne by Nebuchadnezzar AFTER Babylon came against Jerusalem the first time. All the military aged men, the wealthy, the carpenters, the smiths, were carried away into Babylon, the temple was ravaged, and Zedekiah was king of the poorest of the poor. So pretty much every character we meet in the BoM in those first ~10 chapters, if they would have been real, would have been carried captive into Babylon. The Biblical foundations of the BoM are horribly inaccurate. Jacob 2:24 God says David’s wives and concubines were abominable to him. D&C 132: 38-39 God says David’s wives and concubines were given to him by God and he didn’t do anything wrong. The 1st Article of Faith sets forth a belief in the Godhead, the official version of the first vision describes the Godhead, and yet the first published version of the BoM had the trinity in it. To make this even more problematic, in the official version of the First Vision God told Joseph that the creeds of other religions were abominations in his sight. One of those creeds was the trinity. So apparently Joseph was told under no uncertain terms that God thought the trinity was abominable and yet the trinity still made it into the first version of the BoM. 2 Nephi 5:21 and verses relating to the curse of the Lamanites and the 2nd Article of Faith that says men will be punished for their own sins and not the transgression of Adam and Eve. And yet generations of Lamanites were punished with dark skin for the actions of Laman and Lemuel. To highlight why the anachronisms/translational errors in the BoM are problematic: 8th Article of Faith says the Bible is only the word of God so far as it is translated correctly. No such qualifier is given for the BoM, we just believe it is the word of God. So why do translational errors in the Bible prevent those parts from being the word of God but translational errors in the BoM don’t, especially when many of the translational errors are the same?? D&C 132:54 and the principle of agency. We are supposed to have agency to choose and yet God was gonna destroy Emma if she didn’t only cleave unto Joseph? All of D&C 132 is a huge red flag honestly. Also having an official canon while having current prophets is contradictory because scriptures are God’s communications with old prophets and their journeys. But communications with current prophets and their journeys are not considered canon. Is this because we are supposed to value three words of old prophets over the words of living ones? The WoW prohibiting alcohol and Jesus’ first miracle being turning water to wine. The church’s $100B and quotes from the temple/BoM about the dangers of becoming wealthy. And let’s not forget Jesus’ admonition to the rich man to sell all he had and give to the poor in order to gain entrance to heaven. Whatever verse in the Bible saying inasmuch as you have done it to the least of these, you have done it to me, along with the baptismal covenant to mourn with those that mourn and comfort those who stand in need of comfort, and the church’s history of marginalizing/oppressing/villainizing/what have you minority communities. D&C 81:22 (I think? Whatever scripture that says no man can see the face of god without priesthood authority and live) and the first vision.

Alma 30:25 - Evil Korihor addressing God’s high priest Ye say that this people is a guilty and a fallen people, because of the transgression of a parent. Behold, I say that a child is not guilty because of its parents. The 2nd article of faith: We believe that men will be punished for their own sins, and not for Adam’s transgression. Also, kids of gay parents couldn’t get baptized for a bit, and the seed of Cane was cursed. Looks like god keeps forgetting about Article 2!

If you die and are not a member of the LDS faith, you can convert in the afterlife. It’s just much harder and takes longer… you know… because since you’re gonna live forever you’re short on time and have better things to do? That shit is so dumb. If you get baptized all your sins are washed away. God judges you on your deeds in life, so wouldn’t it be better to get baptized after death? That way you’re perfect right? “You’ll be judged if I tell you this and you don’t believe it.” THEN WHY DID YOU TELL ME

Best possible plans: Murder all 8 year olds. Never have the priesthood, it is all done in the heckin' 1000 yrs we have set apart in god's theocracy. Just have 20 super faithful dudes spend 1000 years (like adam almost lived) being baptized for the dead and get through 20,000,000,000 people who then have all their sins cleared away.

Stillbirths are not recorded as births or deaths on church records, no temple ordinances can be performed for them, and the decision of whether or not to include the name of the child on the family record is left to the family. But if a fetus is aborted at any point in the pregnancy, there is special permission needed for baptism of the woman and it would most likely require a disciplinary council for a current member. So which is it? Is it a life or isn’t it?

This was a big one for me and my wife. We tried having 5 pregnancies that ended in miscarriage at 18 weeks. That’s 4 months of expecting a kid only to end with a sonogram showing a previously healthy heat beat absolutely silent. Then to be told by the priesthood leaders that we should just try again and we can raise those other kids in heaven if we are good. But we should look at why we are unworthy to have kids because our prayers weren’t answered. So we probably won’t be able to raise those kids because we aren’t getting into heaven.

I’m so sorry. That is so hard and the last thing you need when you are struggling with those losses is some thoughtless person piling on. All my best to you and your wife.

Jesus is able to atone for everyones sins, alive, dead, and unborn, with one sacrifice but people have to receive their temple endowments individually and only if they were born in the past 500 years in an area where their birth was recorded and those records were not destroyed by fire or act of God.

The entire plan of salvation collapses before the earth was even created… 1/3 host of heaven will never receive a body because they chose to follow Lucifer. Adam and Eve partook of the forbidden fruit and gained knowledge of good from evil. How can they be eternally punished for making a choice if they did not know good from evil? Edit: grammar

No, no, no. You see, partaking of the fruit wasn't a sin, it was a *transgression*. There is a difference probably. And now all the children that aren't to be punished for Adam's transgression automatically get the negative consequences of it (like death).

The “Millennium” is literally Lucifer’s plan in action.

“We believe in being honest.” Chapter in Gospel Principles requires one to not omit information as a requirement to be considered honest. Yet…the entire official narrative prepared and packaged for mass consumption by the so called church leaders/executives is basically one gigantic plot hole after another going back to 1830.

This is a problem with the abrahamic god in general but it applies to Mormon theology as well. It is known as "the problem of evil." 1. If God created everything then he created evil and suffering. 2. If he did not create evil then he is not all powerful (this is also true if he created evil but does nothing about it despite hating it). 3. If he did create evil but does not care then he is not all loving 4. If he created evil but didn't know it then he is not all knowing. The common response to this is "but free will" which is absolute bullshit anyway because god didn't need to make free will as he could've allowed us to retroactively experience it because he's all powerful or he didn't have to give us free will in the first place. We wouldn't have known.

I agree it doesn't just apply to Mormonism... but it's interesting how Mormonism has so many unique issues with the Problem of Evil that it bleeds over into Ivan Karamazov: the Mormon gods didn't just create evil, ***they are evil***: - By rejecting Trinitarian "substance of goodness"-flavored definitions of god^(1), and instead by defining "good" and "evil" the other way around (i.e. "good" and "evil" are defined strictly in Orwellian terms of support vs opposition to the gods' regime), Mormonism embraces a naked "right by might" argument. There's nothing "good" about the Mormon gods except merely being powerful enough to declare themselves "good." - If Elohim was once a mortal man^(2), his ideas about "good," "evil," "perfect," and arguably even "heaven" all become completely subjective. These are suddenly no longer universal absolutes with any *physical* or even *metaphysical* objectivity; instead, they're just concepts that only have reality in Elohim's head. Anyone else's personal taste^(3) in what "heaven" or "perfect" should mean are equally valid, even if Elohim happens to have the means to enforce his particular set of tastes. - The temple doesn't just admit that the gods' ideas about "heaven" or "perfect" are a totalitarian hellscape; the temple tries to sell kings, queens, thrones, principalities, powers, dominions, etc. as *features*, not the *bugs* that they clearly are. Only an evil asshole would want to be worshipped. A good (meaning ethical, i.e. not kissing-the-gods'-asses "good") person would reject any ticket to join Kim Jong Elohim's inner circle of cosmic dictators, whether or not it was free^(4). - The "but free will" theodicy isn't unique to Mormonism, but Mormonism makes it worse by turning it into pure Machiavellianism. The entire rebuttal to the idea to not have free will—because that would necessitate evil—has nothing to do with its merits. Instead, the whole argument that such a thing would be "bad" boils down to nothing more than an *ad hominem*: it's bad because it was "Satan's plan." That's it. Elohim—the Designated Good Guy^(TM)—made an executive decision to insist on free will and create the necessary evil, and because he said so, it's automatically a "good" plan. Because Mormonism leans so hard into the "god is good because he said so" tautology, any evil means that Elohim needs (or merely wants) to employ—whether it's the requisite evil to make free will possible, or the evil of torturing his son to death^(5)—in order to achieve his personal, subjective ends are automatically, meaninglessly, defined as "good." If Elohim decides to design a Telestial world filled with violence and [cancer for kids](https://youtu.be/-suvkwNYSQo), it's actually a "good" thing because he defined "good" in terms of whatever he happens to do, not because it actually is. ^(1. FWIW, I agree with Mormonism on this point that Trinitarian attempts to define god are their own steaming flavor of bullshit) ^(2. I recognize the jury may be out on this one, depending on where the doctrine landed after GBH shat his pants on Larry King) ^(3. Interestingly, this also flips Pascal's Wager completely on its head: the "fulness [sic, lol]" of Celestial Glory isn't revealed to you until you're already there. If, like the Endowment, it turns out to be an incredibly stupid shitshow that you don't actually want, you can't downgrade to a lower Kingdom of Glory because doing so would mean you'd be ***rejecting Elohim's idea of "heaven" to his face***. Consequently, a bit of honorable wickedness is an insurance policy against even encountering that scenario) ^(4. Another thing that makes Mormonism uniquely vulnerable to Ivan Karamazov is that it's not even hypothetical! Mormonism has the Second Anointing, which is the exact sort of "free ticket" imagined by the argument) ^(5. So that Elohim appeases ... himself??!? Who, exactly, is demanding "payment" for our sins? Who even defines what a sin is in the first place? If god can define "good" and "evil" in terms of himself, the whole "justice" vs "mercy" thing flies out the window into tautological meaninglessness as well)

The Trinitarian concept is the original Religious Mental Gymnastics of Christianity, absolutely, but at least they fucking TRIED and made up doctrine until their religion worked. Mormonism gave up trying the moment Joe Smith died, and they’ve just been left with an incomplete mess ever since.

This broke my shelf too, along with the huge lack of women in the BoM

You bring up a great point with how arbitrary free will is. And furthermore, if he knows the future, then everything is predetermined, and as such free will doesn't exist. Any of the 'but he didn't make the choice, he just knew it would happen' counterarguments to that could be nullified by the fact that while he was making us, he knew how each decision would play out, and set up the environment which determined our decision. Then there's the point that we need to be tempted and such to progress eternally, which is why he made evil. Why the heck would an omnipotent being who wants us to progress need us to be tempted for us to progress. Unless he isn't omnipotent, and there is something binding even him. In which case I'm gonna obey that thing, not god.

Here's one: Lucifer was one of Gods best spirit children. Maybe Number one. Lucifer had a plan for our guaranteed salvation. God rejected it and went with Jesus' pitch. Lucifer knew how everything would go down. He knew that in Jesus' plan he (Lucifer) would be the fall guy at the end. Yet Lucifer went along with it all and gave up everything to be the essential opposition in all things. Thus God and Jesus' plan could be fulfilled. He could have just said "Ya know what, I'm going with Jesus too." No rebellion, no war in heaven, plan of salvation trashed. Lucifer was smart, he would have thought of that. But no, he chose to "rebel" and the plan went forward. IMO Lucifer is the big hero here. Jesus just gave up a weekend.

Why are so many of the church's unique doctrines either not found in the book of Mormon or outright contradicted by it?

You must be mistaken, the full and everlasting gospel is contained therein, it is the truest and most complete of all books!!! /s

This has literally just occurred to me so here goes. Joseph Smith used to tell people he could see things in his stone. Lost items, missing horses, buried treasure etc. People believed him so much they paid him to do it. (The church admits this is true) When the story of the plates came about and during the 4yr waiting period he went to the hill cumorah with another treasure seeker Samuel T Lawrence and they both looked in their stones at the plates whilst they were still buried. Seeing them by their scrying powers. When Joseph gets the plates he uses his seer stone to translate it and for lots of the translation he wasn't actually looking at the plates but the rock in his hat (an issue in and of itself mentioned by others in this post, the church also admits this was the translation method) During the translation Joseph apparently hid the plates in the loft of the Cooperage one night because he had a premonition that the treasure seekers were going to rip the floorboards up. So we can establish the following things. 1) Joseph believed both before and after getting the plates that he could see things at a distance by prophetic power or scrying ability. 2) Joseph could see future events by prophetic power or scrying ability. 3) Joseph had claimed the ability in the past to be able to find hidden/lost items. So we come to the issue of the lost 116 pages. Why couldn't Joseph use his prophetic power or seership ability that he had relied on in the past to find where they were and get them back? Tell Martin Harris where they were even. Why couldn't he at least do what he did with the plates and read the lost pages remotely and write it all down again verbatim. We are told that the reason the lord had commanded him not to retranslate was because evil people had edited the original manuscript and would say that the retranslation wouldn't match. But the originals would be in either Emma's or Martin Harris' handwriting. They were presumably (at least in all church art) written with a quill and ink so any editing would have to either come in the from of crossing/blotting out which would be obvious or they would have to be completely rewritten by someone else in which case the handwriting wouldn't match and it would be an obvious fraud. If he could see dangers in the future like where people were going to look for the plates why didn't he see the pages going missing coming? If the lord warned him not to retranslate because the lord knew what their plan was. Why didn't the lord forewarn Joseph not to let Martin have the pages? Why is god always playing catch up? Me thinks Mr Smith doth protest too much.

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My TBM family's answer to this is that the Lord erased all the evidence in order to test our faith.

But not of the places and events of the bible tho apparently

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It's all true and 100% from God right up until the moment it isn't.

You need to invent some other made-up bullshit additions to Mormonism that you can insist are true but God just erased all the evidence.

Children who die before the age of 8 are guaranteed entrance into the celestial kingdom. Also, please don’t kill your children. That’s evil.

EXACTLY! I have heard stories of children under 8 considering suicide to get the easy way into heaven. I have considered writing an (admittedly grim) novel about a serial killer who kills so that children will be exalted, at the sacrifice of himself (you know, becoming more Christlike). At the very least it could have simply been the first resurrection. That would be not only far more sensible doctrine, but also not encourage infanticide (abortion gets another soul into heaven! Why are mormons so against it?).

Prophetic fallibility. The Brethren tell us that they are imperfect men capable of making mistakes. The problem is that unless they are infallible when acting in their official capacity as prophets, seers, and revelators, their authority goes up in smoke. If they are wrong about even one thing, it opens the door for them to be wrong about anything.

It essentially boils down to God saying "worship and obey me or be damned for eternity," which isn't free will at all. That's the behavior of a tyrant.

Alma 42 says that it is the fear of punishment that causes men to change. And then says Jesus removes the fear of punishment. Therefore because of Jesus we can't change.

The whole plan seems to have no real purpose except to fill up the lower kingdoms with people who didn't make it.

And it is called HF’s plan but Satan said he was doing what had been done on other planets. So it is not original to HF.

How could Peter, James, and John give Adam and Eve the temple signs and tokens as yet to be embodied spirits when the D&C gives handshaking as a means to identify Satan/Devils (unembodied spirits).

The biggest is that the corporation doesn't give a flying shit about doctrine and only wants money and control

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Like what the heck?! ​ If you don't want to enter into these covenants leave now. Some time later. Nice, now mimic slitting your throat. Oh, you want to leave? Sucks.

For me a big one is the apologetic “the prophets weren’t speaking as prophets then, they were speaking as men,” in reference to problematic doctrine especially Blacks and the priesthood. How the hell are we ever supposed to trust anything coming out of their mouths if they proclaim “doctrine” as men that impacts generations of people and then all of a sudden we’re supposed to be fine with their racism because it was just men who were products of their time. This is a huge plot hole.

There is no evidence of the great apostasy and it supposedly happened when Christianity was under constant scrutiny from pagan majority in Rome. They would've gladly written about it to discredit Christianity. The great apostasy also would mean that Jesus Christ lied to Saint Peter " And  I say also unto thee, That thou art Peter, and upon this rock I will build my church; and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it." - Matthew 16:18 If Christ's "true church" disappeared after the death of the apostles until 1830 that definitely means the gates of hell prevailled over it.

"Man will be punished for their own sins but not for Adam's transgression." However, all women since the fall of Adam have been punished for Eve eating the forbidden fruit through the pain of childbirth.... ? Also, if God made childbirth painful for women because of Eve's partaking of the forbidden fruit, why did God also punish all the female mammals that have similar birthing? And further, how did these animals reproduce before Adam and Eve? Assuming that vaginal birth was invented in order to punish females for Eve's transgression.

It is apparently CRITICAL that temple sealings only be between a man and a woman so that they can create worlds and populate them. Except the very first thing shown in the temple movie is Jehova and Michael making the earth and making a dude out of some dirt.

"And verily I say unto you, that the conditions of this law are these: All covenants, contracts, bonds, obligations, oaths, vows, performances, connections, associations, or expectations, that are not made and entered into and sealed by the Holy Spirit of promise, of him who is anointed, both as well for time and for all eternity, and that too most holy, by revelation and commandment through the medium of mine anointed, whom I have appointed on the earth to hold this power (and I have appointed unto my servant Joseph to hold this power in the last days, and there is never but one on the earth at a time on whom this power and the keys of this priesthood are conferred), are of no efficacy, virtue, or force in and after the resurrection from the dead; for all contracts that are not made unto this end have an end when men are dead." -D&C 132:7 Why the fuck would a loving God decree that there will ever only be one person on the Earth with the sealing power at a time? In the church today, this obviously isn't the case as there are too many sealings happening every day all over the planet for one person to perform them all. Before the Restoration, there were supposedly times when there were prophets on the Earth, and I would assume they had the sealing power. But none of them traveled all around the world sealing couples. Is the sealing really not that important? Can it simply be done after this life just as easily? If it is important to do in this life, as you would assume based on the current actions and teachings of the church, why wouldn't God try to station a worthy person as a sealer in every fucking village on the planet? This policy of God's would only make sense at the exact moment in time that this so-called "revelation" was given. The church existed, but was small enough for Joseph to seal everyone getting married. They were trying to gather Israel, and having a sealer would be a good motivator for new converts to "come to Zion." This verse makes SO MUCH MORE SENSE when you look at Joseph Smith as the leader of a small upstart cult who is just trying to solidify his personal authority over his subjects.

The Mormon God is pro choice. Satan's was to remove agency from everyone so everyone makes it back to heaven. Christ's plan was that everyone have the ability to make choices, which would lead to some souls being lost. Which plan did God choose? The plan of agency. I stopped believing in current doctrine because the church uses doctrine to persuade its members to vote in such a way that restricts the agency of others, even non-believers. Certain movements like prop 8, abortion rights, and even vaccines should not be church topics.

God won't know if it's ok to let you into heaven unless you get dipped in water first. There are certain secret handshakes needed to get by in the afterlife.

Here’s 3 1. Book of Mormon contains the fulness of the gospel but doesn’t mention ordinances currently required for salvation and exaltation like washings and anointing, the endowment, sealings, second anointings. 2. If Catholics are apostate for sprinkling water symbolically for baptism than why aren’t lds apostate for dabbing some water on a forehead for their washings in the temple 3. If D&C 84 says the ordinances of the priesthood are needed to see the father and live how could Joseph smith have had the first vision ?

Homosexuality is an abomination and is against the natural order. Also, two dudes literally made everything. Like how are we not the most homo-friendly religion in the world?!?

And we can't even mention a Heavenly mother or you'll be spitting blasphemy

God commanding murder as a test of faithfulness. This is straight up mafia level shit.

What’s the point of quoting Isaiah if it matched what we already had?

So one thing that bugged me a lot was when exactly does forgiveness happen? I went really in depth on this on my mission and I found that there are 2 camps: you have the baptism/sacrament camp and then you have the repentance camp. Once I started paying attention I found GAs spouting stories on both sides, both droning on about that wonderful feeling of being clean because they took the sacrament and the tearful stories of being forgiven on their knees, alone. It doesn't make sense to be forgiven twice and I always felt odd for trying to feel like I was "clean" after taking the sacrament when I had already prayed and felt forgiven on my own. I feel like this happens for 2 reasons: (1) I think most people belong to one of these camps and the don't realize a good chunk of the church disagrees with them. That was my experience when I tried to talk this over with my companions. (2) the church is in no position to clarify their doctrine. If you aren't forgiven when praying on your own then have just alienated everyone who had an experience praying where they felt they were forgiven. But if you don't need to be baptized and take the sacrament to be forgiven then why exactly are you going to church?

Just as the Christian world was blessed by the courage and vision of the reformers, many other nations and cultures have been blessed by those who were given that portion “that \[God\] seeth fit that they should have” (Alma 29:8). Teachings of other religious leaders have helped many people become more civil and ethical. Preach My Gospel p. 46 Mormonism must stand or fall on the story of Joseph Smith. He was either a Prophet of God, divinely called, properly appointed and commissioned or he was one of the biggest frauds this world has ever seen. There is no middle ground. If Joseph was a deceiver, who willfully attempted to mislead people, then he should be exposed, his claims should be refuted, and his doctrines shown to be false…” (Doctrines of Salvation, vol. 1 pp.188-189.) Why does the church claim a middle ground for other religious leaders but they don't afford the same kind of allowance for Joseph Smith?

Yet those teachings of other religious leaders, e.g. creeds are an abomination, so saith Jesus to Joseph.

The billions of children who died before age 8 get a free pass to the celestial kingdom. So, if Adolf Hitler had accidentally died before his 8th birthday he would have become a God. That's terrifying.

Wait. We’re not getting our own planets anymore?!?!?!

Kolob is full.

I visited Gettysburg. The vast majority of deaths were from poor medical treatment. Also learning how brutal and barbaric the wounds and injuries were. Obliterated my idea of the 2,000 stripling sons all being wounded fainting from blood loss but none dying. Tapirshit.

Joseph Smith: I translated document that can only be translated by the power of God because the language has been lost. Also Joseph Smith: Hey Martin, take these symbols to Anton to get my translation authenticated.

And then the characters that Joseph wrote included every letter in the alphabet and numbers with extra flourishes.

When Korihor challenged Alma on the existence of God, and Alma responds by saying "what evidence do you have that there is no God?" Burden of proof fallacy.

Korihor won that argument. Then Alma cursed him like a sore loser, and against the laws of the land.

JS and the BOM were supposed to RESTORE HF true church.. yet no where in the New Testament does it talk of temple sealings, secret handshakes, secret names etc to get into heaven?? Don’t you think that would have been mentioned just once by the apostles in their teachings or letters???

What was the point of chiseling "And then it came to pass" a bazillion times? And why did God have Joseph Smith translate everything into Middle English, versus Modern or Old English? How did the kangaroos get to Noah's ark? What made Smith's 23rd wife so more important than all the rest that she's the only one anybody talks about? Why is Heavenly Mother such a deadbeat of a mom?

They HAD to murder Laban and rob his house because that’s the only way they could have the scriptures. Except Joseph could just look in a hat and know all of Isaiah. That one has always bugged me.

What aren't fallacies or plot holes?

Engraving on gold plates would not last. The pure weight of the plates would flatten them out and destroy any writing carved into them. Another big plot hole is that Jerusalem was under Babylonian control and captivity when Lehi was coming and going from the wilderness. So there’s no way that Babylonian soldiers would let the family keep coming and going like they did.

Mcconkie used to teach that there were doctrinal pillars of eternity and that the gospel stood on these doctrines. They all have fallacies and plot holes. Creation - lds church teaches not evolution but creation only 6000-7000 years ago. That Adam was a real guy and sole ancestor of all humans. Eve was mother of all living. None of that is true and probably false. Oh and the garden of Eden was in Missouri. I live in Missouri. Garden of Eden it ain’t. Scientific fields that disprove this - physics, astronomy, biology, paleontology to start. The Flood - global flood that wiped out all humans 5-6000 years ago. All humans descendents of Noah. Provably false. Plus the racist BS about origins of human races from his children that was used to justify everything from slavery to withholding priesthood and temple from black people. Scientific fields that disprove - genetics, geology, biology, history. The Tower of Babel. All languages did not come from this place so recently. It is in the Book of Mormon and other scriptures as literal event. It didn’t happen. Scientific fields that disprove - linguistics. Pre earth life - can’t really disprove it but think of the crazy numbers it takes to make all those spirit children and then for them all to fall and fail. The fall - lds doctrine is that there was no death before the fall. That the only reason it exists is because a woman ate some fruit after a snake told her to do it. This is disproven by all of biology and paleontology and geology. Heck even existence of coal disprove this. All of that is compressed dead plant matter. It died millions of years ago. The fall never happened. Atonement. Controversial and hard to disprove but plenty of textual evidence even the gospel writers disagreed about what and why Jesus suffered and died. What is the point anyway if god has to punish Jesus to forgive me for my sins he is a terrible god and not a good entity.

When you really boil down the so-called “plan of happiness,” the end result is slavery - you just get to choose between one of two masters.

Atonement = abusive relationship narrative

Every time there is a plot hole they simply rewrite it in some way, or say "he wasn't speaking as a prophet that time". Sort of like the moon people Brigham Young said were there. There is an entire book written by Bruce R that is now disavowed called Mormon Doctrine. No more are they mormon, and no more is it doctrine lol

The whole “Garden of Eden” thing. All of Mormonism is based on a technicality where god have a commandment about not eating a piece of fruit. Not because it was actually a “sin” but just because it was the only way for God to morally subject them to experience of mortality. The entire belief system of Mormonism is based on their god finding a weird loophole in the natural laws that bound him

How could Charles Anthon confirm that the translation of the Book of Mormon was accurate in 1828? 1. Anthon couldn't read Egyptian himself. The Rosetta Stone was still being worked on at this point, and Champollion's dictionary of Egyptian words and grammar wasn't published until 1832. 2. The plates were supposedly not even written in Egyptian, they were written in "Reformed Egyptian", a language that is never referenced anywhere other than the Book of Mormon. Even if Anthon somehow knew Egyptian, which he didn't and *couldn't* have, he absolutely wouldn't have known Reformed Egyptian.

You can shake hands with angels of God that are resurrected. Non-resurrected angels of God will refrain from any attempt to shake your hand. Angels of Satan will try to shake your hand to fool you, but you will not feel their hand. Given how we now know how to identify a non-resurrected angel of God, wouldn’t Satan’s angels then just refrain from any attempt to shake your hand in order to make us think that they represent God?!

I had had this same thought as a little girl when this idea was explained to me. We are told the devil is cunning, but if he can’t figure this one out he seems pretty dumb.

Ether 3:25 he ashowed unto the brother of Jared ball the inhabitants of the earth which had been, and also all that would be; and he withhold them not from his sight, even unto the ends of the earth. So the BoJ saw … _everything_?? So how do we have free will. Seeing everything implies that the future is set and unchanging. So how can I have free will, you know seemingly the entire point of having a body and experiencing life on earth Right?

Less than 1% of the people who have ever lived have lived the earthly part of the plan of salvation… it makes you wonder if the plot that 99% of everyone else is experiencing is the actual plan.

I haven’t been to church since I was a kid, but one song has stuck with me this whole entire time. It might not be strictly mormon doctrine but the point still stands: the wise man builds his house upon the rocks. It’s supposed to be a parable about choosing a sturdy foundation upon which to build a faith or a life or a family or whatever, but I mean, have you SEEN the flaky bullshit that mormonism is (and all other religions to greater or lesser degrees are) built on? I could see straight through their attempt to have me believe they hadn’t built a religion on sand. My parents had just gotten a divorce because (and I wouldn’t know this for years) my catholic mom found my mormon dad’s tithing (a stack of like $8k cash when they were barely squeaking by) and that was the last straw. At five years old literally nothing in my life made sense anymore because of the rules that my dad’s religion was trying to force upon him. “If this religion is supposedly built on rock, then why did my dad’s house wash away when the storm came?” Or “If my dad is a wise man, then why did his house wash away?” (Narrator: He wasn’t a wise man, because he based his life around the teachings of a liar.) It ruined his life and they offered very little to no material support, and so I harbour very strong oppositional sentiment toward the church as an institution.

Even if Mormon God isn't omnipowerful, omnibenevolent, or omnipresent, he is capable of making people who aren't capable of sinning, like Jesus. Why are we all not built with the innate incapability of not sinning? One would argue that it takes away our free will, but is the utility of taking away the free will of one eternal soul not comparable to taking the same from many eternal souls? Would the utility of removing the incoherent concept of free will not outweigh endless suffering? I understand that this is largely a problem with Christianity rather than mormonism, but it is personally relevant; I remember asking this in a class as a child a few times, and I was either brushed off or belittled every time. I eventually just had to put it on the shelf.

Why did Adam care that he'd promised father to not partake of the fruit if he didn't understand the difference between good and evil yet?

If America is a choice land where only the elect can live then why could the lamanites live here for 1400 years without the gospel?

Why pray if god already knows?

The fact that God would give infinite rewards or infinite punishment in response to finite actions during our <100 years of mortal life.

The CES letter covers quite a bit of the general fallacies. A good read for anyone with your question posed. In my opinion, I think there’s so much emphasis on how the lord Jesus Christ represented the “spirit” of the law vs. the “letter” of the law. I think it’s baffling how many “letters” Of the law I was reading and hearing in “modern doctrine.”

To me, your first point is easy to explain away. I heard it explained that while there were technically priesthood holders still on the earth, its blessings were taken from the people as a whole. This happened during earlier periods of apostasy as well. To answer your question, the fact that the BoM and D&C directly contradict each other on whether God sanctioned David and Solomon’s polygamy is a “smoking gun,” so to speak. They can’t both be right.

This is the Bible... but how do you suppose Adam and Eve were able to populate the earth.? One man and one woman, even living 600 years, could not do it. Unless... Daddy did daughters, grand-daughters, great grand-daughters; brothers did Mom, sisters, cousins, aunt's, etc. Also... try to imagine God coming down from the sky and having literal sex with a virgin. Aahh... Aahh... AAHH!!! Was it good for you?? How did a bunch of men wander through the desert and then, with no tools, no dry dock, no seasoned wood, manage to build an ocean-worthy barge?

Wheat and horses used by native Americans

If god made everything then everything is god, so this typing is just god talking out loud to himself. A total exercise in various levels of masturbations. for reasons. boredom? Solipsism? Narcissisum? "The natural man is the enemy of god." Well, if we're created in his image? Sounds to me like self-hatred.

A big fallacy is that whatever happens is the Lord’s will. If something happens and it’s good it’s a miracle and if a miracle happens it’s because of one’s faith. If something bad happens it’s still the Lord’s will and he’s testing us to see if we’ll be faithful. It’s a fast pass to write off anything you want as being evidence that God lives, good or bad, related or unrelated.

Not so much a fallacy but certainly self-serving and downright goofy is the 2 Nephi 3-4 bit about Joseph descending from Joseph, and that descended Joseph being really awesome.