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A: Hello, Thanks
for visiting our website, and thanks for writing. First, I must applaud your
interest in your RLDS friends. They are lucky to have a
conscientious Christian like you for a friend. Your
RLDS friends tell you that the Book of Mormon verifies the Bible. Nothing could
be further from the truth. The Book of Mormon actually contradicts
the Bible in a number of serious ways. In my book Part
Way to Utah: the Forgotten Mormons I have 3 chapters on the Book of
Mormon (chapters 5-7) which demonstrate many of these contradictions. You can either get a copy
of my book or just review these chapters online; the entire book in on the
website under Resources/Online Books. A good place to start would
be chapter 7, under Book of Mormon Anachronisms. Chapter 15,
The Heresies of
Joseph Smith’s Priesthood, also documents how the Book of Mormon seriously
contradicts the Bible when it comes to priesthood. Look under The Building
Blocks of Heresy, and scan down to the Book of Mormon heading to read more. They
also say King James had the Bible translated for his own purposes, and that it
contains many errors. Ask them to show you these errors. And then ask them
to explain how they know they are
errors, and what their significance might mean. Chances are they will point to
passages which Joseph Smith himself altered in his Inspired
Version of the Bible. I have an entire chapter on the Inspired
Version in my book (chapter 9), which you might find helpful. The
Bible is the most well-attested book in human history. There exist over 5,000
manuscripts of the New Testament alone. And there is remarkable agreement among
them all. The slight variations which do exist are inconsequential when it comes
to Christian faith and practice. To underscore this fact I would recommend the
book The New Testament Documents: Are They
Reliable? by Biblical scholar F.F. Bruce. The Dead Sea
Scrolls—which predate Christ by 2–300 years—also underscore the accuracy
of the Old Testament. One of these scrolls contains the entire book of Isaiah,
and is nearly identical with the Masoretic text, from which the Old Testament in
today’s English Bibles has been translated. So in reality, it was Joseph
Smith who did what they accuse King James of: he altered the Bible to
suit his own purpose. I
very much appreciate your dilemma as you talk with your RLDS
friends. It is hard to accurately discuss Christianity with one who rejects the
authority of the Bible. After all, what other legitimate authority could there
be? But Joseph Smith was not the first one to reject the authority of the Bible
in order to establish his own doctrine. There is another man who did the exact
same thing many, many years ago. He was so successful that he ended up creating
a whole new religion, just like Joseph Smith did. This new religion became so
successful that his followers now number 1.2 billion people! His name was
Mohammed, and we are dealing with the result of his religious innovations today
in the Middle East. There are striking parallels between Joseph Smith and
Mohammed. I have summarized a number of these parallels in an article on my
website. Look under “What’s New,” and go down to May 22, 2002 and find the
article “I will be a second Mohammed.” To
be successful with your RLDS friends you will most likely have to shake their
confidence in what they already believe. As long as they feel they have the
ultimate truth they will continue to feel that it is you
who should listen to them. That
can change only if their confidence becomes shaken in what they already believe.
So you need to be prepared to do just that—shake their confidence. My book
will help you do that on the points you raised above, and a whole lot more. Many
Christians have been successful by
talking to RLDS about their un-Biblical priesthood system. Once you understand
what the Bible has to say about priesthood, it is very easy to show how wrong
the RLDS system is. And the RLDS priesthood issue cuts right to the very
foundation upon which their church was built. So once their priesthood system
falls, the rest of the church falls right along with it. I devote 6 chapters of
my book to a Biblical analysis of the RLDS priesthood
system, chapters 11–16.
The final 2 chapters of my book also deal with Understanding the RLDS
Dilemma,
and Helping RLDS to Victory. God
bless you as you continue to work with your RLDS friends. We will pray for both
you and them. Paul Trask |