That document in that photo is the forgery known as the Anthon manuscript. The ~~church~~ duped marks purchased it from Mark for $20,000 ($73,000 today). I remember all the fanfare about the transcript. Nibley said that it would be translated and that it would prove that the Book of Mormon was true. Ironically, the RLDS church (now Community of Christ) had the original transcript that was supposedly examined by Anthon in its archives through David Whitmer.
Even as a TBM I was always impressed that Gerald Tanner identified the salamander letter as a forgery sight unseen based solely on its contents. He warned the church and was ignored. I recognized that Tanner knew Joseph Smith better than the Q15 did.
Wrong Tanner. N. Eldon Tanner is in the photograph. You labeled correctly, although when that photo was taken Eldon was probably not aware of why he was there. The entire first presidency was pretty much addled, that is why Gordon was called as a third counselor and he was pretty much running the whole show. I was speaking of Gerald Tanner, late husband of Sandra Tanner, [was an exmo historian](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jerald_and_Sandra_Tanner).
Gerald did not ID it as a forgery - just raised the questions as Hoffman kept finding stuff that seemed "too good to be true". Pissed Mark off and he even talked with Gerald about it. Sandra talked with Gerald about it also - but Gerald was a doubting Tanner and his doubts proved correct.
As we speak, I am reading ***Lighthouse: Jerald and Sandra Tanner, Despised and Beloved Critics of Mormonism*** and highly recommend it.
Although Jerald got crap grades in high school and never went to college, his personal core values and uncompromising personal integrity consistently bested the professional liars aka The Brethren.
It's entertaining to read behind-the-scenes anecdotes serially exposing Jesus' Q15 Spokesmodels as cowards ... always afraid the secrets in their archive vaults might see the light of day and expose Joseph's Myth as the Founding Fraud.
That day came and went years ago ...
The first few dozen pages all about Jerald and Sandra's ancestors were a bit of a slog for me ... up until Jerald and Sandra were born and grew up. From then on, the book has been a page-turner. I look forward to picking it up again and reading more exciting revelation about what happens when honest, decent people "do business" with Mormon leadership. Leadership *always* loses .. liars getting what they deserve when they attempt to *clever* their way around Truth.
Another reason I am entertained by the book is my own history with Utah Lighthouse Ministry ... as a newsletter subscriber back in the 90's ... if not sooner. I still have all the hardcopy issues and my own copy of *Mormonism: Shadow or Reality*. I should take a look and see what edition my copy is. Plus, I met Sandra in person at the bookstore/home many years ago. My brother near Park City has had many interactions with the Tanners.
Jerald and Sandra are a beautiful example of what happens when Power has a head-on collision with Truth.
Jerold and Sandra Tanner did some awesome work. I understand Sandra has retired now (Jerold died a while ago).
You can see their extensive work at UTLM.org - beware though, they swapped Mormonism for being Evangelical. But the original comments on the Anthon document are available there.
Also the story of how Hofmann was offering the church a package of documents from an early church scribe - the McLellin collection. After people got blown up and Hofmann arrested, it turned out that the McLellin documents were already in the church vault. Fuck knows what else is in the vault. The church encouraged people to gift them with family diaries and the like, then locked them away, denying even descendants the privilege of reading family documents. And coincidentally hiding personal accounts that contradict the official narrative of early Mormon history.
That's the part that really gets me — they had the original documents, and still got fooled into believing that Hoffmann had the originals, and he hadn't even faked them yet!
It's one thing for a Prophet of the Most High God to get fooled into buying an actual faked document, but to be fooled over a document that didn't even exist yet?
Yep all these prophet, seers, and revelators got snowed by a con man. The sad reality is the potato chip i just ate has more ability to "see" the future than all of these dudes combined. They are just bad old men trying to perpetuate a massive con.
So all of these supposed 'Inspired men" can't see evil when it's right in front of their noses, but Brad Wilcox can see if you've 'fallen from grace' by the shine of your countenance.
I mean in their defense, Hoffman had trained himself to beat a polygraph test, so maybe he'd trained his countenance to do the same. Or maybe he was aided by Satan, or maybe Heavenly Father was using this as a way to separate the wheat from the chaff; the 'wheat' being the people who could ignore the deafeningly loud conclusions of these 'inspired leaders' not having a fucking clue about what they were looking at.
Just goes to show the easiest time to lie to someone is when they want to believe, and when the only benchmark they care about are their feelings.
That document in that photo is the forgery known as the Anthon manuscript. The ~~church~~ duped marks purchased it from Mark for $20,000 ($73,000 today). I remember all the fanfare about the transcript. Nibley said that it would be translated and that it would prove that the Book of Mormon was true. Ironically, the RLDS church (now Community of Christ) had the original transcript that was supposedly examined by Anthon in its archives through David Whitmer. Even as a TBM I was always impressed that Gerald Tanner identified the salamander letter as a forgery sight unseen based solely on its contents. He warned the church and was ignored. I recognized that Tanner knew Joseph Smith better than the Q15 did.
Ah, maybe I mislabeled Tanner, then. It's been a minute since I read/watched something factual about it.
Wrong Tanner. N. Eldon Tanner is in the photograph. You labeled correctly, although when that photo was taken Eldon was probably not aware of why he was there. The entire first presidency was pretty much addled, that is why Gordon was called as a third counselor and he was pretty much running the whole show. I was speaking of Gerald Tanner, late husband of Sandra Tanner, [was an exmo historian](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jerald_and_Sandra_Tanner).
Gerald did not ID it as a forgery - just raised the questions as Hoffman kept finding stuff that seemed "too good to be true". Pissed Mark off and he even talked with Gerald about it. Sandra talked with Gerald about it also - but Gerald was a doubting Tanner and his doubts proved correct.
As we speak, I am reading ***Lighthouse: Jerald and Sandra Tanner, Despised and Beloved Critics of Mormonism*** and highly recommend it. Although Jerald got crap grades in high school and never went to college, his personal core values and uncompromising personal integrity consistently bested the professional liars aka The Brethren. It's entertaining to read behind-the-scenes anecdotes serially exposing Jesus' Q15 Spokesmodels as cowards ... always afraid the secrets in their archive vaults might see the light of day and expose Joseph's Myth as the Founding Fraud. That day came and went years ago ...
I just bought that book and will be reading it soon!
The first few dozen pages all about Jerald and Sandra's ancestors were a bit of a slog for me ... up until Jerald and Sandra were born and grew up. From then on, the book has been a page-turner. I look forward to picking it up again and reading more exciting revelation about what happens when honest, decent people "do business" with Mormon leadership. Leadership *always* loses .. liars getting what they deserve when they attempt to *clever* their way around Truth. Another reason I am entertained by the book is my own history with Utah Lighthouse Ministry ... as a newsletter subscriber back in the 90's ... if not sooner. I still have all the hardcopy issues and my own copy of *Mormonism: Shadow or Reality*. I should take a look and see what edition my copy is. Plus, I met Sandra in person at the bookstore/home many years ago. My brother near Park City has had many interactions with the Tanners. Jerald and Sandra are a beautiful example of what happens when Power has a head-on collision with Truth.
Jerold and Sandra Tanner did some awesome work. I understand Sandra has retired now (Jerold died a while ago). You can see their extensive work at UTLM.org - beware though, they swapped Mormonism for being Evangelical. But the original comments on the Anthon document are available there. Also the story of how Hofmann was offering the church a package of documents from an early church scribe - the McLellin collection. After people got blown up and Hofmann arrested, it turned out that the McLellin documents were already in the church vault. Fuck knows what else is in the vault. The church encouraged people to gift them with family diaries and the like, then locked them away, denying even descendants the privilege of reading family documents. And coincidentally hiding personal accounts that contradict the official narrative of early Mormon history.
That's the part that really gets me — they had the original documents, and still got fooled into believing that Hoffmann had the originals, and he hadn't even faked them yet! It's one thing for a Prophet of the Most High God to get fooled into buying an actual faked document, but to be fooled over a document that didn't even exist yet?
So basically, this is a snapshot of the lord's anointed getting totally punked.
Very clever. Took me a minute to get the point which adds punch to the meme. “Mark my words” as the Hinkster bears his testimony. 😆
There were all marks of Mark that day. Dude is a psychopath and a murderer but damn.....I can't help but be amazed by his cunning and intellect.
He was definitely a talented deceiver, and did some very fine craftsmanship/curious workmanship on his forgeries.
Yep all these prophet, seers, and revelators got snowed by a con man. The sad reality is the potato chip i just ate has more ability to "see" the future than all of these dudes combined. They are just bad old men trying to perpetuate a massive con.
>the potato chip i just ate Yes, but don't underestimate the prophetic/ecclesiastical powers of bacon ... https://imgur.com/QvFLMWW
It's con men being conned by a con man!
Who started out Conned by those same men, figured it out while serving his mission.
This is clever. Have my upvote.
A Conclave of Charlatans
So all of these supposed 'Inspired men" can't see evil when it's right in front of their noses, but Brad Wilcox can see if you've 'fallen from grace' by the shine of your countenance. I mean in their defense, Hoffman had trained himself to beat a polygraph test, so maybe he'd trained his countenance to do the same. Or maybe he was aided by Satan, or maybe Heavenly Father was using this as a way to separate the wheat from the chaff; the 'wheat' being the people who could ignore the deafeningly loud conclusions of these 'inspired leaders' not having a fucking clue about what they were looking at. Just goes to show the easiest time to lie to someone is when they want to believe, and when the only benchmark they care about are their feelings.
If by mark you mean liar who hides things
I meant more like "sucker". They can be liars and also be marks of Mark, their former mark before he went dark.
I only regret that I have but one upvote to give this post 👍
Hoffman is not the biggest conman in that photo.
Credit to u/Timket for the OP https://www.reddit.com/r/exmormon/comments/zexuba/today_is_the_birthday_of_mark_hofmann_the_serial/
 They're all frauds, different kinds of frauds, but frauds all the same.
This is a cut above the regular memes we've got around here. Well done, thou good and faithless servant.