Salt Lake Tribune | 1910-11-28 | Page 4 | With Variations

WITH VARIATIONS. To students of tho Book of Mormon there is some interest attaching to the question as to whether or not in its construction' there were plagiarisms from the Old aud New Testaments. While David kWhitnier adhered to his testimony ns one of the threo witnesses to the supposed -di iuity of that book, there was evidently a montal reservation reserva-tion upon somo points. An -intimation of this. fact is' given in his pamphlet, "An Address to AIT Believers in Christ," page "20. In speaking of tho .bopk, Mr. Whitrner says: The church of Christ must be established estab-lished on the teachings of Christ, which teachings In their purity arc In the new covenant or the Book of Mormon, and come forth to us to settle all disputations dis-putations about doctrine, BECAUSE MANY PLAIN AND PRECIOUS THINGS HAVE BEEN TAKEN FROM THE RECORD REC-ORD OF THE JEWS, and" on all doctrinal doc-trinal points order of church offices, etc we must rely. upon It. v David Whitrner was undoubtedly anxious, to guard his credibility as a witness to the Book of Mormon; and in view of that fact it is. not surprising that, he was a littlo inclined to merely intimate the facts. But. for a man in his situation be spoke sufficiently plain to make himself understood to tho discerning dis-cerning mind. There are other evidences, however, that go to substantiate the statement of Mr. Whitrner that many things were" "'taken from the record of tho Jews.". An examination-of tho Book of Mormon Mor-mon will show several distorted plagiar- icms iMi.ili frtr Instnni'P :i Mm fnllnir- ing, taken from tho old Liverpool edition: edi-tion: A variation of Daniel reading the writing on tho wall, page 2155; corruption corrup-tion of Paul's conversion, pago 201; distortion of Poter's escape from prison, pages 2JJ2, 2;"1; variation of tho story of the lying Anunias, .page 241; imitation imita-tion of the stotry of the three men cast into the fiery furnace, page 401: mangled man-gled version of tho story of Elijah's rain and drought, page 417; corruption of tho story of Daniel in the lions' den, page 480. 405. These are but a very few of the very many plagiarisms lo be found in the book, and the stupid effort ef-fort to cover them up in a clumsy change of language is merely evidence of the rank fraud practiced, ami of tho coarse ignorance of the minds who concocted the swindle To the rcasonnblc mind, though, a nioro recital of the process by which the hook. is alleged to have been Tcccivcd aud "translated" is sufficient to brand it for what it is, without going into its pagos at all. . i Although many of the brethren of I the 'Mormon church once declared "down thump" that they would have prohibition, even if they had to "fight to tho death" for it, they have since demonstrated that they didn't want anything of the kind not by a jugful.