Friday, November 7, 2014

Mormon 9:33 and Reformed Egyptian

In Mormon 9:33 it says
v34: But the Lord knoweth the things which we have written, and also that none other people knoweth our language; and because that none other people knoweth our language, therefore he hath prepared means for the interpretation thereof.
And as Joseph Smith Jr expanded the point in his note to the Times & Season (Vol IV, Nr.13, May 15, 1843, p.194) on the meaning of the word Mormon.
Here then the subject is put to silence, for "none other people knoweth our language", therefore the Lord and not man had to interpret, after the people were all dead.
However, the certainty of that translation was marred by an article in the same publication (p.190), an exposition on the influence of the principles of truth, where the writers admitted that the orthographic and grammatical correctness of the revelation was dependent on the vessel of transmission.
But a ridiculous notion is frequently expressed, that the dictates of the spirit, through whatsoever channel they may flow, must necessarily be correctly constructed and perfectly grammatical.
Acts 4:13 allows them to point out that lack of rhetorical training of Peter and John was obvious and commented upon, in spite of the power of their argument.
Here the argument takes the anti-learning turn that was prevalent in the Western Reserve and other frontier areas as a rejection of the types of learning the Eastern and European universities could provide, as (White 1947) points out.
But the truth is, ..., every instrument which the Lord employs will be at any rate gifted with simplicity and sincerity, and whatever the Lord shall be pleased to give unto his people, by them shall be given naturally and without hypocrisy. (p.190)
And almost in order to level the playing field for the wise and the less so, they note that
... the learned and the unlearned are strangely overcome (p.191)
by the principle of truth, and the "superior minds" still become "subject to the principles of truth", even if per se the gospel has nothing that "attracts the self-opinionated and the proud".

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