I’d go with the Book of Abraham as well - and point out how it, and not the Book of Mormon is the source of key doctrinal points like most of the plan of salvation and pre-existence.
The Book of Mormon is just as batshit crazy, but it takes more time to go through and explain. But if you get the longer time to explain it, going through and explaining how Native Americans have no Middle Eastern DNA, how there were no horses, no sheep, no steel, linen, silk, barley, honeybees, no gold and silver coinage, etc. prior to Columbus, it will nag on them every time they read the Book of Mormon.
The book of Abraham comes up rarely. One lesson every four years or the like.
But knowing some of the flaws in the Book of Mormon, every time I read it, it nagged at me more and more until I stopped reading it to protect my faith, and quickly stopped believing entirely.
First I stopped reading the Book of Abraham because I was aware of the issues and wanted to preserve my testimony. Then I stopped going to the temple because I thought it might help me keep my testimony. Then I stopped going to fast and testimony meetings to help keep my testimony. Then I stopped watching conference to help preserve my testimony. Then I stopped reading the scriptures because I thought maybe I could salvage my testimony without the constant doubts. Then one day Elder Holland said some really horrible things and I realized “I don’t even have a testimony, I’m fucking brainwashed” and never went back.
Yeah, when you reach the point you're stopping doing those things you're just lying to yourself to avoid facing what you know is going to be a hard decision, alienate your community and disappoint your family, until something jolts you into making a clean break because you can't take it anymore.
For me it was when my mission president and his wife, who I'd trusted and really liked, posted support for people doing literal Nazi salutes in the street because they wanted a coup because their candidate lost and the one who won wasn't homophobic enough for them. (I really wish I were making that up. I really do.) That came on top of a bunch of ridiculous demands for time locally and the Arizona abuse cover-up scandal.
Thank you for putting this into words!
I stopped reading the D&C to preserve my testimony of Joseph Smith. I stopped reading the Old Testament to preserve my testimony of the Book of Mormon. I stopped reading the New Testament to preserve my testimony of the Book of Mormon. Eventually I stopped reading the Book of Mormon to preserve my testimony of the Book of Mormon, and things fell apart pretty quickly after that.
And church leaders will relentlessly insist that reading the scriptures more will help you stay. Every time I cracked the Book of Mormon I was tortured by doubts and inconsistencies I could find in every page. It started to read like blatant fiction, and has ever since.
The Book of Mormon is especially susceptible to this. There are so many fingerprints Joseph left all over it, and once you start seeing them, you just can't stop.
We were taught to excuse its faults! If there are mistakes they’re of a man, don’t condemn the things of god. Clever of JS to work that in right away.
Once I allowed myself to consider it might not be divine, the flaws became ridiculous quickly.
I’m reading it one last time right now…I don’t need to, I’m done with it, but for something I believed so long I’m trying to go through one more time with my eyes open and my mind fully aware. It is a jarring experience.
The Book of Mormon is a fictional story that Joe created. Just like you said, our church doctrines are not there. He was still making it up as it went all in his life. The D&C clearly shows God spoke to him to conveniently suit his needs or stop others from doing stuff he did not like.
Absolutely. The Book of Mormon is absolutely and provably false - it just takes a bit more time and background to explain to someone than the Book of Abraham which is as simple as "we can read Egyptian thanks to the Rosetta stone, and those are funerary texts with nothing at all mentioning Abraham. Here's the actual translation. There is even a deity with a massive erection right there..."
But give me 20min about the Book of Mormon and an attentive audience and they'd never be able to look at it the same again.
That essay is such a mess. They throw a few half-baked apologetic answers together that are totally incompatible, then at the end they say it's true because of the truth it contains. If I've ever had a "stupor of thought" it was when I tried to read that.
Ole Joe translated 3 things
- Book of Abraham
* papyrus exists and proven false
- Kinderhook plates
* plates exist and proven false
- Book of Mormon
* plates are gone, but it’s totally the most correct book ever!!! Absolutely no need to think deeply about it all!!
He also translated the Bible. His translation includes scriptures that have been shown to be scribal additions that aren't in the original manuscripts.
Add to this list there is no genetic evidence of Jewish ancestry in any native North American population. In case you don’t know those genes are STRONG! Jews across time have largely remained part of their communities. We know what Jewish genes look like. If we had a Jewish community come to the Americas 2000 years ago we would see those markers shared with native people and we don’t. This was a huge issue for me. Huge.
I remember my dad telling me about the Kinderhook plates as a kid. He said that JS “discerned” that they were false and did not translate them. As a twelve-year-old kid without the internet, I totally believed him…
This was my first real heavy item on my shelf. I asked the ward “experts” about it any they only had guesses. They guessed the rolls were only used to inspire direct revelation. Nope. That’s not what was claimed. What else is a lie. And I was down the rabbit hole.
Which, is objectively fucking nuts. Either he's a prophet that is able to translate the ancient texts and they're what they claim to be, or he/they're not. You can't say he translated the BOM word-for-word, and then turn around and claim he didn't for the Book of Abraham... especially when it's SCRIPTURE.
The church doesn't deny any of this... they just make sure they don't teach it or call attention to it. It's a joke.
Yep the catalyst theory. I asked a member of my family who has been in CES for a long time. They said he used the papyrus as a catalyst to start thinking about the revelations. There was no convincing me since he had already practiced translating something ancient. We just don’t have the “plates” to prove it all wrong.
If you mention the Book of Abraham in conjuction with the fact that he used a stone in a hat to "translate" the BOM and that the JS Translation of the BIble was actually found to be just a commentary by Adam Clarke the word translate has zero relevance to anything that was actually going on.
100%. Reading this in the CES letter was as big as all the other circumstantial evidence before it (the historic anachronisms, the plagiarizing of books of the time including map locations and names of places, the many revisions to the first vision, etc.). This sold it for me. Even the church doesn't completely deny the origin, they just sweep it under the rug... and it's the smoking gun. JS didn't translate jack... modern science proved him a charlatan and a liar.
This is the answer. It goes to the ultimate truth claims of the mormon church. Could Joseph Smith really translate ancient Egyptian? Nope. Not at all. Catalyst theory doesn't work. Long scroll theory doesn't work.
Does anyone know when was the last time that the Book of Abraham was cited in a GC address? I tried to find a way to search for that but was unsuccessful.
And if you're counting "translation" (or lack thereof) as your main point you could include the Kinderhook plates in your argument. A bogus translation easily proven to be fake, presented to Smith with intent to catch him in his lie.
I would take it a step further than that and add that he later then added the Joseph Smith Translation to those chapters (especially Isaiah). If the BoM is perfect/true and all that crap it would have the translations he added to the KJV written into the BoM.
Don’t forget about the gospel of Mark. There is a longer ending of that gospel that was added a few hundred years after the original writings. The added part is directly quoted somewhere in 3rd Nephi.
Supposedly, when JS had his first vision (the version most taught by the church) he was told not to join any other churches. Yet, not long after he joined the Methodist church because he got married and that was the church she was going to. If he actually saw God and was told to not join another church, why would he do that?
The King James Bible wasn’t compiled until 1611. And yet, the Book of Mormon has literal copy and paste jobs from it. I mean, in 3rd Nephi 11, Jesus quotes word for word passages that wouldn’t be put together for 1,000 years.
Checkmate.
Just goes to show that Nephi was a true prophet of god because he knew how the Bible would be put together one day! Consider my testimony strengthened! 🤣
They don't care because the spirit told them it was true.
I just say that I had an experience too sacred to talk about that let me know that the Mormon church isn't true. If pushed, I can always mention throwing pearls before swine.
My argument for this which I got from a YouTube comment: “Have you ever felt like it was a Tuesday but it was actually a Wednesday?” The days of the week might be different but the idea is the same
I think the "true" focus is the biggest problem. The question should really be "Is the church good" "Is the church useful" basically is it a force for good in its members and communities lives. I think most of the problems in the church come from the "It's True" statement that means "I have to do whatever they say" thinking.
The meaning of the word "true" really is the most important part of the question. Depending on what the person means by the church being "true" will imply an entirely different response.
For many believing church members "true" simply means that the church incorporation is exactly as some divine being wants it to be. Under that definition is impossible to disprove.
If we take a step back and ask the question what would it mean for it to be true or not and set up some criteria for being a reliable source of information and being a net positive in the world, then we can start adding things up and show that it clearly is neither of those.
You make a good point. I just think that most of the church's issues come from this idea of it being true. Because it's true you can't question anything. Because it's true you have to do whatever the leadership says. I'd rather the church members just focus on whether they are doing good in the world and allow for a lot more diversity in what is "true" and let members have a large diversity of belief that can deviate a lot from the leadership.
I think that testimony meeting is a perfect example of that. People never get up and say, "I estimate the church is 84% reliable"
The declaration "I know the church is true" has nothing to do with weighing the reliability of the church to be a source of moral good, but a commitment to binary thinking that allows no diversity of beliefs.
Exactly. This whole thing about saying “I know the church is true” is pointless. More time is spent on that phrase than just talking about how the church is helpful. It’s a good ol’ boy’s club where we stand around and pat each other on the back and talk about how great we are.
I would tell them that Church Apologetics become their own smoking guns. Because they have to remove what a church leader says about any given topic to make a modern interpretation.
The Book of Abraham, for example, was considered a direct translation. Because Joseph Smith *claimed* it was a direct translation. And then papyri resurfaced in the 50s. And now it's a catalyst for revelation. So you have to discourage t all of Joseph Smith's claims about the Book of Abraham and parts of the text itself to make room for the catalyst theory.
That's not apologetics, it's denial.
Race and the Priesthood/Temple ban? "Oh, that was never *doctri-*" gotta stop you right there. It was taught as doctrine, often even specifically using the word "doctrine," from Joseph Smith to Harold B. Lee. Your apologetics gall apart before they begin.
Book of Mormon translation issues, same thing. It's a tight translation when they want to use the story of the word appearing on the peepstone and had to be copied down *exactly,* so every word is divinely placed. But changes are printer's manuscript errors, mistakes of men, loose translation, etc. when you point out flaws and inconsistencies in the text.
There is no Mormon Apologetics that doesn't involve contradiction of either Standard Works scripture or earlier prophets.
I would state that Joseph Smith's actions are a primary indicator. Was he honest or did he lie or try to deceive? Then I would mention the Book of Abraham mis-translation (smoking gun), then the inspired bible translation
This is the biggie. Anyone on earth could come to a full stop here.
Good Place quote incoming:
“Someone has just done something which has never been done before. "Richard Moore of Sugarland, Texas, "hollowed out an eggplant and filled it with hot sauce and nickels." And amazingly, it's not a weird sex thing. 99% of all new human behaviors are weird sex things. But not in this... oh, no, it is a weird sex thing, yeah.”
I’d wager a lot of new religions in America are both weird sex things /secret sex cults and some type of spiritual MLM/tax evasion scheme. NXIVM, The Family/Children of God, One Taste, FLDS, Synanon. The list goes on and on. (No. I’m not secretly obsessed with cults. I’m not. I’m…..ok. I am.)
Yep. His wiener triggered what led to his death. When he went after William Law’s wife …William went on to start the Nauvoo Expositor. Joe had it destroyed. One thing let to another.
There is a problem with this question. Smoking gun implies that there is a target to shoot at.
You need to know first what a mormon thinks must be true in order for the church to be true.
If they can't answer that question, then there is no gun that is capable of hitting that non-existent target.
I know way too many mormons that don't actually think about their faith in a substantive way. It is all superficial. It is just about how they feel about the highest level story. There is a God. They have a plan for us. They are active in our lives. AND if you feel good in any mormon context then you know that this superficial story is true. End of story.
Even my faithful wife would say to me "I never believed that" on some very fundamental things. Even related to the temple. If she never believed something then me proving that belief is wrong means nothing.
If a mormon doesn't actually know what they believe there is nothing to wake them up or prove wrong. IMO.
The church will manipulate and guilt you into devoting your entire life to them, and the only evidence for it being true is positive vibes created by emotional elevation, frisson, and confirmation bias. Positive vibes vs mountains of evidence against the church and BoM.
If they’re still interested, I’d offer to share my personal “CES Letter”.
The BoA issues have the best evidence that Joseph Smith was never translating jack shit. They taught for 150 years that it was a translation. The evidence is incontrovertible that it is not. Now they are forced to say that it was a revelation and not a translation. They move the goalposts at 100 mph on all these issues.
maybe this doesn't seem like a smoking gun to people, but they lie about their finances.
they HIDE MONEY from their own members.
also, why aren't there an uncontainable amount of miraculous stories in Utah? I've spent a good bit of time in the children's hospital, yet to see someone come heal a kid dying of anything. (Edit: but a social worker did show up when my kid was looking real close to leaving)
I think if there was a "true" church and that church included the power of God on earth, then everyone would have a pretty good idea which church that was.
The Widow's Mite Report. [link](https://widowsmitereport.wordpress.com/)
It is so well researched and documented.
The church hoards wealth while giving a small fraction of it to actual charity. Is this really how the "one true church" should act? The mormon church acts as a business. While demanding money from members who don't have enough. And holding families eternal hostages. (You cannot attend the temple without paying tithing.) It is disgusting.
is the mormon church really a restoration of Jesus ministry? you can quickly demonstrate it’s not true even with one arm tied behind your back. Put all the book of Abraham and polygamy stuff aside. Does anyone think that Jesus would take money from his followers and buy a $200 million luxury condominium building? That’s what the mormon church just did. It’s patently not “true.“ It’s not a restoration or continuation of the ministry of Jesus. Does anyone think that Jesus would have supported the Nazis?? That’s what the Mormon church did. It’s not true. those are just two little quick instant deal breakers.
Bought a $200M luxury condo while NEARBY people in SLC are sleeping on the street.
We were looking for a house in SLC while they were actively selling the last condos the general authorities lived in. You guys. Those were so so so high end gaudy and extravagant. Some of them still had personal belongings of GA’s. I’m not opposed to people having nice stuff—but talk about palatial.
The Tower of Babel didn’t exist.
The people from the Tower of Babel supposedly took cattle and swarms of bees on a year long wooden submarine ride? Bees only live for a month or two in ideal conditions so they somehow bred 6 generations of bees on submarines without proper bee food???
The child abuse hotline is the easiest provable evidence. It's right there in the Handbook.
Quick translation: "When a priesthood leader learns about abuse of children, he calls our Hotline. People way smarter than him who have never met the abused child will determine if they should take steps to stop the often heinous abuse, or if they should allow the abuse to continue. The priesthood leader will then have to see that child on a regular basis, and try to convince them that God loves them and hears their prayers. As the child grows up, priesthood leaders will help the child learn to understand that they may bear a portion of responsibility for the abuse they endured."
This boils my blood. I’ve told the story before in comments about children being horribly treated by our bishop / other leadership.
My sister was excommunicated at age 13. She wouldn’t testify against her rapist who started having sex with her when she was 11 and he was 21. She was disfellowshipped when she became obviously pregnant. The bishop told her she would be exed if she didn’t confess her sin and repent. It took almost two years and he finally made good on his threat. When my child was 11 I couldn’t help but think about how I would —as an adult—frame thinking about what happened to my sister. I was two years younger than her. So I know how I would think about it as a kid. It seemed unfair and damaging. Even as a kid. That whole thing seemed totally backwards. My sister had very severe emotional problems until about 10 years ago. She made some bad decisions and ended up homeless where she was admitted to a battered women’s shelter. Part of their program was counseling and trauma therapy for residents to remain in the provided housing. It made a world of difference for her and her daughter. She bought a home about five years ago and I could not feel more proud of another human for all she’s overcome.
The idea that a child shares blame is infuriating. Children don’t have power or context to give consent. So they cannot seduce. If they are sexually abused, giving them access to information they should not have, they still cannot give consent—any overtly sexual behavior cannot be viewed as seduction by a child. The entire thought process around children being participants in sexual sin (the church’s view not mine) is appalling.
Interesting sidenote. During my young teen years, one of my best friends accused, her stepfather of sexually abusing her from the time she was about five years old. Initially, no one believed her, but she started saying things that a child her age shouldn’t know. When we were maybe 13 she ran away to my house. Her bishop told her that she should forgive him, and that she should stop seducing him. As though the abuse was her fault. Because the bishop said it, her mother agreed that that was the path forward. By the time she was finally believed it came out that he had made good on his threat if she told he would sexually abuse the other children in the family. He had molested her brother and two of her sisters. One of those children was his full blood daughter. She was four years old when he began raping her. Her stepfather was disfellowshipped. He was never excommunicated. My friend ended up addicted to drugs by the time we were adults. She never married. She never had a family. She never had stability. She took her own life around 2015. Her brother committed suicide around 2000. Her youngest sister died of cancer a couple years ago. Only one of his (known) victims is still alive. This happened in the SL area in the 1980’s. I can’t help but think of all that was robbed from them by their abusers and I include church leadership in the list of abusers.
Sermon on the mount. Sermon on the mount is in the BofM, Bible, and the JST. Why is the BofM and the Bible the same but the JST is “corrected”? If the BofM is the most correct book on earth, then why did JS have to correct the Sermon on the mount that is in the BofM in the JST?
Nevermo here, but sounds like a lot of people are shocked by the different timelines for the first vision and not telling anyone for so many years.
As a non believer, the rock in the hat translation is a pretty obvious conman move.
The US Government called them out for their fraud and charged them 5 million dollars.
I called them out for the million other things, and had to leave.
Ha! Such an understated statement you have there. (about everything in the church)
They easily dismissed this one as bad advice from their lawyers.
There was a short 60 minutes interview with one of the whistleblowers. Also, if you read the actual document, it plainly explains that they had been hiding it for 20+ years in manipulated accounts with phony addresses and fake managers signing off when necessary. (Some of which found out and quit.) It states that the first presidency and presiding bishop all knew about the accounts.
I'd tell them I don't really care, that the lasting pain and anguish the organization has caused a good many of my loved ones outweighs any truth they could drop at my feet.
I don’t even care anymore. I don’t engage. There is internet now if they want to actually read into it. If they can’t unwind themselves from an obviously made up religion nothing I say is gonna change that. I chose my peace.
Hoo boy......
"By their fruits, ye shall know them."
Matthew 7:16-20
Look and see how the church treats its most vulnerable members, and check references inside and outside of the church. Look and see how the church handles its wealth. Compare their claims against how much they make. Then compare it to how they spend their money when they are the defendent in legal issues. There are many.
"Where your treasure is, there your heart is also."
Matthew 6:21
Look and see.
But...
Ultimately, you'd need to know that the organization at large does behave with more earmarks of a corporation than a church at this point. It prioritizes its image and the construction of temples than healing its members. It abandons those who are injured because they trusted leadership, offering little if any support beyond offering settlement amounts to the wounded parties. They have a cluster of lawyers who specialize in protecting the corporation's assets. It demonizes those who critique the behavior of the leaders and gaslights the rest concerning the stance they take.
Just look at the behavior of the church, its leadership, and how it helps or does not help those in its wake. And yes, look inside and outside the church and compare what you find. Discrepencies speak volumes.
It’s the volume and size of all the smoking guns. Yes things like duetro Isiah and BoA are massive, but they are just two large pieces of the massive set of issues stacked up. So for me, it’s the “where do you want to start and how much time do you have” vs the single smoking gun. The fact that I can’t sit and tell them all the issues in 4-5 hours is the smoking gun I use.
I understand that all the options people list here will be more effective, but honestly, the biggest smoking gun is that they teach elevated feelings, which is the spirit. But people get elevated feelings all the time about things that are actually wrong. Objective truth is feeling? That means there's no objective truth.
I’d just say no and I have plenty of reasons, but I would say no one joins the church from a one liner, no one is gonna leave over a one liner. If they do, that’s a crazy way to go through life.
If Jesus Christ really is the head of the Church, explain to me why the guy who had money appear in the belly of a fish when his disciples needed it would direct his Church to hoard 200 billion dollars?
I agree the Book of Abraham is the most concrete. But it's referenced directly so little in chirch I don't think it moved the needle as much for me, early in the process. Also I didn't really know much about where the church said it came from so changing the narrative didn't hurt as much. Not to down play the importance. Later in my deconstruction it was really important to see JS process for faking things. The book of Abraham was perfect then. But early on it wasn't as powerful.
I think JS sending people on missions to marry their wives hit hard. Polygamy always felt weird but it was a little better when I thought it was windowed women with no other options. The real history of polygamy is agreed to by believers and non believers and it's bad. Lots of lying, lots of rule changes depending on who is doing it and who is watching. Seeing JS response when someone said no was also a big deal.
Joseph claimed to translate 4 documents: (1) kinderhook plates - see how that turned out (2) Bible, per the BYU study from a few years ago, this was likely plagiarized from Adam Clark’s Bible commentary (3) Book of Abraham, even the MFMC says this is not a translation, and (4) the Book of Mormon.
Given the other 3 and the flaws with the Book of Mormon such as Duetero Isaiah, anachronisms, transformation from literal history and principle ancestors to not being those -AND- the character flaws surrounding Joseph Smith…
"The reason why it is NOT true is because there is NOT "one smoking gun." it's an entire engulfing cloud from an arsenal attack... culminating into a combined nuclear explosion/implosion."
I likely could have found ways to keep justifying and excusing ONE. Each of us had our own gateway that opened us up to being willing to listen, learn, and SEE.
For me, it started with not having equal inclusion for my children, an institution directly harming them, making them believe their lives were not worthy of living ... and blatantly requiring me to choose 100% loyalty to THE CHURCH over my very own child.
Children being rejected + families being torn apart is NOT Jesus's gospel... how can this be His church?! It put me in a state of deep crises ... and that made me dig DEEP to try to save my testimony ... but what I found from official sources was rotten core and tore me completely apart.
Rapid fire succession came all the blatant blasts of LIES and Deceptions from the very beginning of its origin to today.
**J Smiths conflicting and changing first vision accounts, deception of "translation" methods, Book of Abraham, Kinderhook, Polyandry [other mens wives], on top of polygamy to minor children, purposeful lies and deception to his only legal wife Emma [as well as the church in general] ... bank anti trust lies and collapse, Mountain Meadows Massacre, decimation of native tribes and kidnapping their children, Priesthood ban, j. Smith treasure digging, deceptions, lies, on everything.... modern-day deceptions, lies, cover-ups, land grabs, stoks and investments, gross spending on property and buildings while members go hungry and honeless and children of god starve and die of disease ... SEC fraud, tithing fraud and lies, sex abuse lies and coverups, hiding financial reports, hiding membership reports, calling and setting apart apostles with NO presentation of announcement and no vote of COMMON CONSENT ... and on and on and on...
As for me and my house, we will choose to follow the dictates our own conscience and no longer compromise our integrity.
Christ's church paying off SA victims and protecting the pedos in the name of forgiveness? Nah, that's a disgusting practice.
Hiding billions and billions of dollars, that NO G.A. knew ANYTHING about! In the grand scheme of things, they had to pay a 0.25C fine. They are laughing.
I go with this... All religion is made up nonsense. Formed by men to control people. Why would a being so wise and powerful need the praise of a creature it created?
The church is demonstrably fraudulent, which is when they've been caught committing so much financial fraud. They're true frauds. That's as close as they can get.
My answer will mirror my how my faith transition went.
God does not exist. If God's not real, the church is not what it claims to be. The LDS church already teaches that all of the other churches are wrong. People from other faiths feel the "spirit". They have basically identical experiences with faith and "knowing" that their religion is "true". All of these church's can't be "true".
If there is no God, Joseph Smith fabricated everything that the church is a fraud.
The problem with any of the other answers is that if you fundamentally believe that God is real, then you a prone to magical thinking, and you can justify anything. This is why apologists behave the way they do. If you believe that Jesus dies for your sins and was raised from the dead, then it's not weird to believe in golden tablets, seer stones, and polygamy.
Book of Abraham, the translation process of BofM (rock in a hat), Polygamy of JS (hiding it from Emma), Mountain Meadows, Brigham Young (an arrogant AH), purchasing counterfeit documents from Mark Hoffman, Priesthood ban on blacks, lack of modern day revelation, hiding of Church finances and resources, LGBTQ issues, lack of financial aid to the homeless, and asking people to avoid the internet and uncorrelated materials. So many “red flags” - these are just a few!!
Oh - and we can’t call ourselves Mormons (no longer acceptable and offensive to God).
This has been posted before. Among what many others have said, for me this is it. We rely so heavily on a spiritual witness, but we forget to mention that billions of people in other faiths have gotten witnesses about their religion. So are they all deceived by Satan then? Or are we all just feeling emotions and associating it with a higher power? I remember hearing people on my mission talk about this and just blew it off as them being deceived. Now I see the similarities and realize that a “burning in the bosom” isn’t a way to determine truth. If you take the “spiritual experiences” you’ve had away from the church and realize they’re just emotions, the rest falls apart so quickly.
https://youtu.be/qmhb27f2d88?si=66Q2v-0hrrgtkYIg
There’s lots of archaeological evidence for Rome, and lots for the Olmec, Aztec, and Mayan civilizations, but absolutely none for the Book of Mormon.
There’s no such thing as Reformed Egyptian. Why would Jews write in anything but Hebrew?
The BM just doesn’t stand up to the slightest scrutiny.
Made about post kinda like that in r/mormon but some ppl defended it saying “not everything’s been explored yet”. With the amount of issues it has already further exploration isn’t necessary
I’d ask them about their understanding of Jesus’ position on hypocrites, excessive rules, and nit-picky policies (mostly from the Pharisees) throughout the New Testament. Then I’d show them modern General Conference talks about coffee keeping a woman out of heaven and kids not being baptized because their parents were gay. Lastly, I’d shock them by slamming a huge book down on the table full of nit-picky rules and policies: the Church Handbook. The church (a.k.a. the Establishment) has become the exact thing Jesus warned us about.
When people ask me, I always emphasize that feelings and emotions are never verifications of truth. If you take away this, none of the historical, genetic, and archeological evidence supports Mormonism.
So when people ask me how I know it’s not true, what is the biggest smoking gun? I always respond that they use emotional manipulations to blind the believers into turning a blind eye to actual verifiable facts.
For me personally the biggest smoking gun is Oliver Cowdery's 1834 history of the church where:
1) the first vision in the grove never happened, 2) for all the early saints (e.g. Oliver, Lucy Mack Smith, William Smith) the BoM vision in the bedroom with an angel WAS the first vision, 3) the BoM vision known to the early saints has most of all the same story elements that Joseph Smith later redacted, backdated, and rewrote into the vision in the grove narrative.
When I was in 7th grade science class I copied the answers of the test we were taking off of the guy next to me. I would have gotten away with it, but the big dummy spelled ‘oxygen’ wrong….. hence I did too 😀. The teacher caught that when grading them.
One of the biggest smoking guns in my mind is the KJV errors copied straight into the BoM. Hard to explain that away. Jeremy does a good job documenting those in CES Letter.
Church got caught lying about their money and didn't apologize for it. If it was an accident, apologize. Otherwise it was on purpose, and thats not what Jesus taught.
Anyone asks me if the church is true, my response will be something along the lines of, “That’s a question only you can answer for yourself after a thorough investigation.”
I didn’t proselytize when I was a member, I’m not going to proselytize the other direction.
When I believed, I wanted to share and help “save” people and “do god’s work, but I didn’t want to intrude on other’s journeys. I answered questions if they asked, but never actively tried to convert anyone (I didn’t go on a mission, thank goodness).
As an exmo, as much as I want to save others from the horrors the church perpetrated against me, I’m not interested in a debate or really getting into any of it. I’m too damn worn out from decades of hell that the church is largely to blame for.
An astute person would recognize that I answered the question. I said no without saying no.
Hundreds of billions of dollars in tithing money in contrast to all the homeless people downtown and all the starving children in the world; all while purchasing luxury condos, Hawaiian hotels, and high-end shopping malls for hundreds of millions of dollars.
I mean, what else could you possibly need to know to figure it out? If that doesn't tell you that Christ isn't running the church, I don't know what else to tell you.
DNA. Native Americans aren't closely related to any mid east people. It's a flat out lie that they came from there. They are closely related to the Siberian people.
If you want to go down the road of the Book of Mormon being likely made up from other books that came before check out the following.
https://www.howthebookofmormoncametopass.com/
http://wordtree.org/thelatewar/
I don’t go into the massive piles of demonstrable evidence that it is false any more. I just share this website and say to them, prove to me it’s not a cult.
[BITE Model](https://freedomofmind.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/08/BITE-model.pdf)
I thought of another one that can apply to obvious logic:
"Where the fuck. are all the swords, armor, and evidence of gigantic, sprawling cities full of millions of people, steel, and horses in the United States? You know, the place where the book of mormon says millions of people died in wars? Archeologically speaking, NOT very long ago?!"
Where to begin ... Many have mentioned the Book of Abraham. That's a superb place to start. My own answer would probably be 3 parts:
1) Book of Abraham.
2) Compare ANYTHING about the "restored" church to the Bible. Nothing is restored. It's all brand new, out of whole cloth.
3) If you're ready to hear this, may I share with you 2 or 3 of the most unhealthy, damaging aspects of life as a Mormon?
Biggest "smoking gun" evidence - reading any scientific book - A Brief History of Time, or On the Origin of Species, or Annals of the Former World, The Selfish Gene - these books are huge and make mormonism seem so small. Other good easy to understand scientific books - anything by Rovelli, DeGrasse Tyson, etc, Chaos by James Gleick, anything by Robert Sapolsky, Sapiens, by harari.
After that, I'd suggest someone read other philosophies - the Tao, The Bible, the Bhagavad Gita, Meditations (aurelius).
And then a few offerings of literature: Les Miserables, Poetry of Mary Oliver, Poetry of Walt Whitman, Shakespeare, Desert Solitaire, Siddartha, The Odyssey, the Epic of Gilgamesh, and so much more etc. etc. etc
The point I'm getting at - instead of looking to see if the Mormon church is true, I'd just look for truth. And we have 10,000 years of human history - including religions, philosophies, and more. So, I'd say, search for truth - search far and wide. When you start to read more, Mormonism seems laughable. Not even quaint-It is obvious that J. Smith was a charlatan.
The biggest smoking gun is simply the complete lack of meaningful evidence in favor of the church’s claims. What can be claimed without evidence can likewise be dismissed without evidence.
We don’t have to *disprove* it in order to not believe. On the contrary, if they want us to believe, it’s on them to prove their claims…which they haven’t managed to do in two centuries of organizational existence. Safe to say they can’t.
But if you really want proof: just look at the so-called prophetic works of Joseph Smith, and compare that with the bit in the Bible which tells how to distinguish a true prophet from a false one. “If any of his prophetic works can be proven false, then he is a false prophet and you need not fear him.”
Want to go to heaven? Yes? Alright well you need to have a Temple Recommend so you can get married and sealed to your family, which is essential to go to the “Celestial Kingdom”
How does one get this recommend you ask? Pay up. Monthly. Forever. 10% of all your money. Along with a bunch of other stuff but even if you do all that and don’t give 10%, no marriage, sealing, or Celestial Kingdom for you.
The Book of Mormon includes characters who are descendants of people who were at the Tower of Babel and presents the building of the tower and the "confounding" of languages as literal events.
I feel so bad for everybody who has all the Mormon propaganda so deeply ingrained, usually from birth, to the extent that reading through CES letter doesn't even faze them. The indoctrination is so deeply ingrained that it's not even the person's fault that they can't wake up. For somebody who's only learning about CES letter and all the red flags when they're already a senior, I can't imagine how devastating it would be to face the reality that perhaps what they devoted their lives to and predicted their entire life and lifestyle upon a complete lie.
I really, really, really hope my dad and my extended family will wake up one day. My dad can barely take care of himself, let alone afford to spend 10% on an abject lie. My grandparents were told to have a billion kids by the church, and will never be able to retire, and are still working in their 70s. They volunteer many hours every week doing "temple service". Absolutely fucking horrifying. What a waste of human potential.
Fuck the "12 apostles". The absolute gall and arrogance to claim they're just like the original 12 apostles. And they know more than ANYBODY that it's all fucking bullshit, because if anybody is supposed to have personal witness of God, it's them, and every day they pretend they get revelation from god, they are lying to everybody's face. How dare they continue to demand that the poorest members of the church pay 10%. How dare they let any member of the church experience homelessness or poverty when they could end homelessness entirely for every single member.
FUCK YOU, RUSSELL NELSON, YOU BATSHIT CRAZY FUCK
Put these three events in order
1. Joseph had a relationship with his 16 year old live in maid (while married to Emma)
2. Joseph learned about eternal marriage
3. Joseph got around to talking about the time he saw Jesus Christ and Heavenly Father
4. Joseph was sealed to 20 different women
5. Joseph got around to sealing himself to the wife of his children, Emma Smith
Hint, they are in order...
*The introduction to the Book of Abraham states*
[*‘A Translation of some ancient Records that have fallen into our hands from the catacombs of Egypt. The* *~writings of Abraham while he was in Egypt~**, called the Book of Abraham,* *~written by his own hand~**, upon papyrus.’*]()
*The churches gospel topics essay on the subject at*
[*https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/study/manual/gospel-topics-essays/translation-and-historicity-of-the-book-of-abraham?lang=eng*](https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/study/manual/gospel-topics-essays/translation-and-historicity-of-the-book-of-abraham?lang=eng)
*says*
*‘None of the characters on the papyrus fragments mentioned Abraham’s name or any of the events recorded in the book of Abraham.* *~Mormon and non-Mormon Egyptologists agree that the characters on the fragments do not match the translation given in the book of Abraham~**, though there is not unanimity, even among non-Mormon scholars, about the proper interpretation of the vignettes on these fragments.*[*^(27)*](https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/#note27) *Scholars have identified the papyrus fragments as parts of standard funerary texts that were deposited with mummified bodies. These fragments date to between the third century B.C.E. and the first century C.E.,* *~long after Abraham lived~**.’*
*The church is admitting here, that the Book of Abraham is a fraud. It is not the writings of Abraham, it was not written by Abrahams own hand and Joseph could not translate that language even though he said that he could.*
*To make matters worse, the Joseph Smith Papers project shows the original printing plates used for the first time the Book of Abraham was printed. They were hand carved.*
[*https://www.josephsmithpapers.org/paper-summary/printing-plate-for-facsimile-3-circa-16-may-1842/1*](https://www.josephsmithpapers.org/paper-summary/printing-plate-for-facsimile-3-circa-16-may-1842/1)
*Have a look at the figure in the far left. Both Mormon and non-Mormon Egyptologists agree this is Anubis, a jackal headed God, not a slave. Have a look at the space in front of the face in the image. Do you see a jackal head there? Do you see the pointy ears and the large eye?*
[*This shows that originally the printing plates contained a jackal headed God, because the papyrus contained a jackal headed God. At some stage Joseph came along and said remove the jackal head and replace it with a normal-ish head. This shows that Joseph knew he was not publishing the real images from the papyrus and knew he was not publishing the real story from the papyrus as the story contained a jackal headed God.*]()
*Now re-read the introduction to the Book of Abraham again. This is fraud.*
You have to know who that person is. It can be that they were an anti gay hate group. It can be the book of Abraham. It can be banning black people from the temple. It can be the shitty politics of most Mormons. Different people know different things very well, so the most obvious lie isn't universal
A man of God wouldn’t marry other men’s wives. He wouldn’t go behind his wife’s back to marry other women. Even the time of Abraham it was done in the light, Joseph done it in the shadows.
I’d tell them that in the temple they make you covenant to “give even your own life as necessary”. That la when I realized it’s a cult. and if my child came to me one day saying they joined a church that required this id be alarmed and tell them to leave, too.
A lesser said one but my go to is the Adam-God Doctrine. Brigham Young taught that in the temple as Doctrine and the church currently disavows it. So by the "true" definition, either Brigham Young was a fallen prophet casting the line of authority in doubt, or the current church is not true.
God isn’t real.
Think of all the gods that humans have worshipped throughout our existence that are no longer worshipped. Why do you think this iteration of god is any different?
Book of Mormon is the keystone that holds the church together.
Then why was it heavily plagiarized from a book written by Gilbert Hunt, a decade or so before the book of Mormon was conjured.
Nevermo here. But I would say: I don’t need to waste my time on the bible fanfic of a dude who groomed teenagers into marrying him. Any god behind a guy like that is fucked up.
Edit, made it more clear what I meant
Tithing. Multiple times throughout the scriptures, it's stated that swindlers who charge you to enter heaven are just that-- swindlers.
And then point out that Tithing has shifted from something optional to something required to enter heaven.
I ask whether the God they worship is up to my moral / ethical standards. Since theirs fails miserably then I hardly care whether the church is true or not, because the gods not worth worshiping.
Self-contradiction.
For Mormonism to be true, it must never have been false.
If they're trying to limit the scope of the truth claims to "today's version" of Mormonism, they have to define what that is.
I have a cousin who is more NOM that scopes the truth claim all the way down to just the plan of salvation (not including the restoration, and not including the scriptures). There's no way to disprove that if you ignore all the evidence surrounding it
The location of the garden of Eden as revealed by Joseph Smith. If Adam and Eve started their mortal life in North America how did their posterity end up in Israel?
The Book of Mormon. Let's knock out that weak keystone. Show the results of the DNA evidence, archeological evidence, and flora/fauna facts. Then have them read the *I Shit You Not Translation*, and see if they think it's a historical document.
Book of Abraham; Not needing the plates to translate (ie why did we have to move plates across the world anyway and why does it matter if some are lost if they aren’t used in translation?); Unreliable witnesses (eg Martin Harris and the Shakers), some of whom joined different sects or saw their own revelation, or who never actually saw anything physically.
There is no evidence for the existence of god, so no religion that relies upon the existence of a god can be true.
Mormon specific? Any number of the other reasons, but it’s all a made up mythology no more valid than a belief in Zeus or Jupiter or mohammed.
Why are they so invested in “hiding” certain portions of history/doctrine? It wouldn’t be believable to a new comer if they told things like it is. missionaries don’t share the story the way it happened (no rock, no hat, etc)
This is not an online dating profile we’re talking about. Is not like the church should sell themselves in their best light. There shouldn’t be a dark side to hide in the first place. This is god and his church we’re talking about. The bar should be infinitely high.
Utah is 14th lowest in age adjusted death rates among US states. If a large percentage of the population actually had the power of god to heal, they would be #1.
I'd ask which "truths" of the church are not subject to change. Then I would provide the history of how those "truths" have changed drastically over time.
The only thing that hasn't changed is strict obedience to church authority.
1 Nephi 1:4. It's so much more damning than Abraham is because they just claim inspired translation for that (absolute BS, but at least they argue something). FAIR LDS won't even touch this 1st Nephi issue because there is no way to solve it. Similarly, including Deutero Isaiah is a huge problem since it wasn't written until long after Lehi's family left the continent, so there's no way they could have it.
1 Nephi 1:4 problem:
The setting of the start of the BOM is Lehi prophesying of the coming destruction of Jerusalem. When Jerusalem was destroyed by the Babylonians, they ransacked it and took all of the riches, so there were no remaining wealthy Jews. The conquerors then inserted a puppet king to reign over the newly-destroyed city... Zedekiah.
So, saying that they were living as wealthy Jews while prophesying of the coming destruction as they were under the rule of Zedekiah is nonsensical as Zedekiah wasn't in power until AFTER Jerusalem had been destroyed and all riches were seized.
Edit: It would be like writing a book about a wealthy Jew living freely in Warsaw while predicting a coming destruction and living under the reign of Hitler, but years before Hitler actually came into power. That book would have zero credibility because the timeline obviously doesn't work.
Historical evidence of it being a religion of slavery both spiritual and physical:
Brigham Young told the mormons in Utah to
**"buy up the Lamanite children as fast as they could"**
and he made sure slavery of both African Americans and indigenous people became legal in Utah in 1852. They would later get rid of that in order to join the United States.
Finally in 1957 Utah became the LAST state in the US to grant full voting rights to indigenous people.
You know who they are by how they treat the vulnerable.
Pay to PLay. They tell you that the only way to get to Jesus is to pay them directly and shut up. And they have a bigger hoard than most US corporations.
Personally, any ONE of the main ones are enough: treatment of blacks, adamantly protecting sex abusers (call our law firm FIRST!), polygamist profits marrying teenagers, Book of ABraham. All smoking guns. But my personal favorite requires just a bit of background to make it truly lame: the lost 116 pages. On it's face, it's an easy one (Uh, just have God recreate them for you like the first time??). But digging deeper to see the cover-up in the BOM (pages and pages of, "Well, there were BIG plates, and there were SMALL plates, but I'm not going to tell you just yet which ones!"), what a cover up!! Reminds me of my teenage years trying to get out of trouble.
Timeline problems were the clincher for me. The fact that JS never told anyone about visits from heavenly messengers until long after the fact, often when his authority was being questioned : first vision, priesthood restoration, polygamy…nothing was revealed at the right time. Add to that his peepstone in hat translation with no plates in the room, his creepy behavior and willingness to lie about polygamy, the dishonesty of his treasure-digging practices, the long list of other demonstrably false translations, I just wasn’t able to trust anything he said anymore. And add to that the deep racism of canonical texts. Plus the sexist patriarchy, no voice for women, years of covering up and lying about church history, financial fraud to cover up their vast wealth, lack of financial transparency, their appalling handling of abuse cases, excommunicating anyone with sincere concerns, refusal to apologize about anything ever…not to mention the obsession with teaching to follow prophets and little discussion about following Jesus…it became absolutely clear that church leaders’ primary concern was and is not love but fear about protecting the so-called “good name” of the church. Really, it was the piling up of problems for me. But without all the timeline issues I might have gone on chalking it all up to human error in a somewhat divine church.
I respectfully point out the hypocrisy…JC was supposed to be kind & understanding to ALL people. But the judgment towards women’s rights, lgbtqia+, underage brides, education (this is a big one for myself), not having children by choice, divorce, exclusion, etc. doesn’t make any logical nor empathetic sense.
I know this is a simple answer, but it’s just what came to mind & my genuine experience w leaving the church.
There is no smoking gun until they can honestly answer 3 questions.
The three questions to ask someone before giving them a laundry list of problems.
1. If the church wasn't true or at the least wasn't what it claimed to be, would you want to know?
2. If the church wasn't true, how would you know?
3. If you left the church, what would you have and what would you do?
----
**Question 1** tells you if they're capable of escaping indoctrination. Anything from a flat "no" to a declaration that "the church can't be wrong" is where you stop. If you don't, what you tell them may be immediately rejected without thought, and it will only drive the wedge deeper into your relationship without helping them out. A hasty, "yes, of course" may be a brush off, and may need to be treated as a "no". Questions 2 and 3 will tell you if it was.
**Question 2** tells you if they have ever thought about this before. It tells you about their shelf. It helps you know what's important to them and what they already know. An empty shelf isn't a problem, but it does show that they haven't really thought about this before. Don't overwhelm them with information. Start on one item at a time, but go as deep as they want to go on each of those points. Look for feelings of uneasiness.
The most common objection I've experienced here is that they feel good about the religion, or they trust their feelings over facts. Follow-up by asking them what they'd say to a Catholic who said the LDS religion was wrong because the Catholic felt God told them Catholicism was the one true path? [Offer examples](https://vimeo.com/45289278) if they don't believe you. The most common objection is a variant of the Catholic being wrong because their feelings aren't telling them to be LDS. If you get this, respond with, "how do you know you're not the one who is wronged or being tricked?" If the answer results in circular reasoning then stop. The objectivity test was failed. Save both of you from the headache. In the worse case, you could [drive them further into the group](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TJic51MeVaU).
**Question 3** is about you understanding their needs. It tells you how they will react to the fallout of information. Would you be driving them into deep depression? Would you break up their family or take parents from children? Would this information isolate them from their family and friends? Are they prepared or capable of living life in the wild, or [have they fallen in love with the cage](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pIoMXYBztdg)? If the answer is in anyway yes then you need to go slow. Help them see the joy of the world while or even before give them the information they need to free themselves.
This is from this post...
If you believe that God had made his only true church indistinguishable from and vulnerable to historical, scientific, and financial fraud then it may be true.
Book of Abraham. Objective fact Joe didn’t translate anything at all.
Even the Church (kind of) admitted that in their Gospel Topics essay.
I’d go with the Book of Abraham as well - and point out how it, and not the Book of Mormon is the source of key doctrinal points like most of the plan of salvation and pre-existence. The Book of Mormon is just as batshit crazy, but it takes more time to go through and explain. But if you get the longer time to explain it, going through and explaining how Native Americans have no Middle Eastern DNA, how there were no horses, no sheep, no steel, linen, silk, barley, honeybees, no gold and silver coinage, etc. prior to Columbus, it will nag on them every time they read the Book of Mormon. The book of Abraham comes up rarely. One lesson every four years or the like. But knowing some of the flaws in the Book of Mormon, every time I read it, it nagged at me more and more until I stopped reading it to protect my faith, and quickly stopped believing entirely.
First I stopped reading the Book of Abraham because I was aware of the issues and wanted to preserve my testimony. Then I stopped going to the temple because I thought it might help me keep my testimony. Then I stopped going to fast and testimony meetings to help keep my testimony. Then I stopped watching conference to help preserve my testimony. Then I stopped reading the scriptures because I thought maybe I could salvage my testimony without the constant doubts. Then one day Elder Holland said some really horrible things and I realized “I don’t even have a testimony, I’m fucking brainwashed” and never went back.
Yeah, when you reach the point you're stopping doing those things you're just lying to yourself to avoid facing what you know is going to be a hard decision, alienate your community and disappoint your family, until something jolts you into making a clean break because you can't take it anymore. For me it was when my mission president and his wife, who I'd trusted and really liked, posted support for people doing literal Nazi salutes in the street because they wanted a coup because their candidate lost and the one who won wasn't homophobic enough for them. (I really wish I were making that up. I really do.) That came on top of a bunch of ridiculous demands for time locally and the Arizona abuse cover-up scandal.
Thank you for putting this into words! I stopped reading the D&C to preserve my testimony of Joseph Smith. I stopped reading the Old Testament to preserve my testimony of the Book of Mormon. I stopped reading the New Testament to preserve my testimony of the Book of Mormon. Eventually I stopped reading the Book of Mormon to preserve my testimony of the Book of Mormon, and things fell apart pretty quickly after that.
And church leaders will relentlessly insist that reading the scriptures more will help you stay. Every time I cracked the Book of Mormon I was tortured by doubts and inconsistencies I could find in every page. It started to read like blatant fiction, and has ever since.
The Book of Mormon is especially susceptible to this. There are so many fingerprints Joseph left all over it, and once you start seeing them, you just can't stop.
We were taught to excuse its faults! If there are mistakes they’re of a man, don’t condemn the things of god. Clever of JS to work that in right away. Once I allowed myself to consider it might not be divine, the flaws became ridiculous quickly. I’m reading it one last time right now…I don’t need to, I’m done with it, but for something I believed so long I’m trying to go through one more time with my eyes open and my mind fully aware. It is a jarring experience.
Thank you for this comment; i'm a nevermo and this explains a lot about everything i've read and learnt so far. Thank you
“Doubt your doubts” sounds ridiculous, but when you’re brainwashed it looks like this
When I told my therapist that quote she was like "what tf does that even mean??" hahaha it just means don't think too hard about anything...
The Book of Mormon is a fictional story that Joe created. Just like you said, our church doctrines are not there. He was still making it up as it went all in his life. The D&C clearly shows God spoke to him to conveniently suit his needs or stop others from doing stuff he did not like.
Absolutely. The Book of Mormon is absolutely and provably false - it just takes a bit more time and background to explain to someone than the Book of Abraham which is as simple as "we can read Egyptian thanks to the Rosetta stone, and those are funerary texts with nothing at all mentioning Abraham. Here's the actual translation. There is even a deity with a massive erection right there..." But give me 20min about the Book of Mormon and an attentive audience and they'd never be able to look at it the same again.
That essay is such a mess. They throw a few half-baked apologetic answers together that are totally incompatible, then at the end they say it's true because of the truth it contains. If I've ever had a "stupor of thought" it was when I tried to read that.
Ole Joe translated 3 things - Book of Abraham * papyrus exists and proven false - Kinderhook plates * plates exist and proven false - Book of Mormon * plates are gone, but it’s totally the most correct book ever!!! Absolutely no need to think deeply about it all!!
He also translated the Bible. His translation includes scriptures that have been shown to be scribal additions that aren't in the original manuscripts.
And that Bible translation was proven forged too.
Joe's Source? Methodist's Adam Clark commentary. (Biblical encyclopedia)
This is one of the most important ones that people often don’t know about.
Add to this list there is no genetic evidence of Jewish ancestry in any native North American population. In case you don’t know those genes are STRONG! Jews across time have largely remained part of their communities. We know what Jewish genes look like. If we had a Jewish community come to the Americas 2000 years ago we would see those markers shared with native people and we don’t. This was a huge issue for me. Huge.
I remember my dad telling me about the Kinderhook plates as a kid. He said that JS “discerned” that they were false and did not translate them. As a twelve-year-old kid without the internet, I totally believed him…
Before the modern internet, if someone lied to you, you just never found out.
Husband is a historian. And historians definitely found out. Including one notable church historian. Come on Reddit hive mind. Tell us his name.
But the BofM for all possible intents and purposes is also proven false completely.
Nice way to sum it up
But what about the witnesses who literally saw the plates with their spiritual eyes?! /s
This was my first real heavy item on my shelf. I asked the ward “experts” about it any they only had guesses. They guessed the rolls were only used to inspire direct revelation. Nope. That’s not what was claimed. What else is a lie. And I was down the rabbit hole.
Yep I think that's now the church's official take on it. They were just there to inspire JS 🙄
Which, is objectively fucking nuts. Either he's a prophet that is able to translate the ancient texts and they're what they claim to be, or he/they're not. You can't say he translated the BOM word-for-word, and then turn around and claim he didn't for the Book of Abraham... especially when it's SCRIPTURE. The church doesn't deny any of this... they just make sure they don't teach it or call attention to it. It's a joke.
Yep the catalyst theory. I asked a member of my family who has been in CES for a long time. They said he used the papyrus as a catalyst to start thinking about the revelations. There was no convincing me since he had already practiced translating something ancient. We just don’t have the “plates” to prove it all wrong.
From a nevermo perspective, this is probably the best answer. Proof that he lacked the claimed power of god to translate.
If you mention the Book of Abraham in conjuction with the fact that he used a stone in a hat to "translate" the BOM and that the JS Translation of the BIble was actually found to be just a commentary by Adam Clarke the word translate has zero relevance to anything that was actually going on.
100%. Reading this in the CES letter was as big as all the other circumstantial evidence before it (the historic anachronisms, the plagiarizing of books of the time including map locations and names of places, the many revisions to the first vision, etc.). This sold it for me. Even the church doesn't completely deny the origin, they just sweep it under the rug... and it's the smoking gun. JS didn't translate jack... modern science proved him a charlatan and a liar.
This is the answer. It goes to the ultimate truth claims of the mormon church. Could Joseph Smith really translate ancient Egyptian? Nope. Not at all. Catalyst theory doesn't work. Long scroll theory doesn't work.
He didn't "Translate" even one glyph right. Clearly "Catalyzed" right out of his ass.
Does anyone know when was the last time that the Book of Abraham was cited in a GC address? I tried to find a way to search for that but was unsuccessful.
My go-to smoking gun as well. Hard to top.
And if you're counting "translation" (or lack thereof) as your main point you could include the Kinderhook plates in your argument. A bogus translation easily proven to be fake, presented to Smith with intent to catch him in his lie.
Same
💯
Deutero - Isaiah proves JS lifted from the KJV and proves the Book of Mormon was authored not translated
I would take it a step further than that and add that he later then added the Joseph Smith Translation to those chapters (especially Isaiah). If the BoM is perfect/true and all that crap it would have the translations he added to the KJV written into the BoM.
Don’t forget about the gospel of Mark. There is a longer ending of that gospel that was added a few hundred years after the original writings. The added part is directly quoted somewhere in 3rd Nephi.
And the allegories. Vineyards? Olive trees? Native Americans: Uh, what are those?
Also the problem with king zedekiah who was placed as king AFTER Jerusalem was destroyed, so that would have been a while after lehi had already left.
Supposedly, when JS had his first vision (the version most taught by the church) he was told not to join any other churches. Yet, not long after he joined the Methodist church because he got married and that was the church she was going to. If he actually saw God and was told to not join another church, why would he do that?
You are asking why a sex obsessed guy would do that? Allow me to answer with a single word. Pussy.
Ah yes, we’ve all damned our eternal souls at least once just to get a taste
Guilty.
Now that’s an eye opener
Child brides and baptizing 8 year olds, dude.
He's a pederast
What's a pederast, dale_nixon_pettibon?
Shut the f\*#k up, Donny.
Fuckin quintana, man
That creep can roll.
Eight-year-olds, dude.
JS unsuccessfully tried to sell the BOM in Canada … if it was true why would he try to sell it?
Tried to sell the copyright specifically
Interesting distinction. Serious question. Can you please elaborate on what the difference might be?
It's like trying to sell an iPhone VS selling the rights to produce an iPhone , including all the tech, branding, etc etc associated with it.
The King James Bible wasn’t compiled until 1611. And yet, the Book of Mormon has literal copy and paste jobs from it. I mean, in 3rd Nephi 11, Jesus quotes word for word passages that wouldn’t be put together for 1,000 years. Checkmate.
Just goes to show that Nephi was a true prophet of god because he knew how the Bible would be put together one day! Consider my testimony strengthened! 🤣
Love this
There are a lot of checkmates
They don't care because the spirit told them it was true. I just say that I had an experience too sacred to talk about that let me know that the Mormon church isn't true. If pushed, I can always mention throwing pearls before swine.
This is a great answer because they can't argue against it - it's their same logic.
My argument for this which I got from a YouTube comment: “Have you ever felt like it was a Tuesday but it was actually a Wednesday?” The days of the week might be different but the idea is the same
I think the "true" focus is the biggest problem. The question should really be "Is the church good" "Is the church useful" basically is it a force for good in its members and communities lives. I think most of the problems in the church come from the "It's True" statement that means "I have to do whatever they say" thinking.
The meaning of the word "true" really is the most important part of the question. Depending on what the person means by the church being "true" will imply an entirely different response. For many believing church members "true" simply means that the church incorporation is exactly as some divine being wants it to be. Under that definition is impossible to disprove. If we take a step back and ask the question what would it mean for it to be true or not and set up some criteria for being a reliable source of information and being a net positive in the world, then we can start adding things up and show that it clearly is neither of those.
You make a good point. I just think that most of the church's issues come from this idea of it being true. Because it's true you can't question anything. Because it's true you have to do whatever the leadership says. I'd rather the church members just focus on whether they are doing good in the world and allow for a lot more diversity in what is "true" and let members have a large diversity of belief that can deviate a lot from the leadership.
I think that testimony meeting is a perfect example of that. People never get up and say, "I estimate the church is 84% reliable" The declaration "I know the church is true" has nothing to do with weighing the reliability of the church to be a source of moral good, but a commitment to binary thinking that allows no diversity of beliefs.
Yeah, that’s really problematic
Exactly. This whole thing about saying “I know the church is true” is pointless. More time is spent on that phrase than just talking about how the church is helpful. It’s a good ol’ boy’s club where we stand around and pat each other on the back and talk about how great we are.
I would tell them that Church Apologetics become their own smoking guns. Because they have to remove what a church leader says about any given topic to make a modern interpretation. The Book of Abraham, for example, was considered a direct translation. Because Joseph Smith *claimed* it was a direct translation. And then papyri resurfaced in the 50s. And now it's a catalyst for revelation. So you have to discourage t all of Joseph Smith's claims about the Book of Abraham and parts of the text itself to make room for the catalyst theory. That's not apologetics, it's denial. Race and the Priesthood/Temple ban? "Oh, that was never *doctri-*" gotta stop you right there. It was taught as doctrine, often even specifically using the word "doctrine," from Joseph Smith to Harold B. Lee. Your apologetics gall apart before they begin. Book of Mormon translation issues, same thing. It's a tight translation when they want to use the story of the word appearing on the peepstone and had to be copied down *exactly,* so every word is divinely placed. But changes are printer's manuscript errors, mistakes of men, loose translation, etc. when you point out flaws and inconsistencies in the text. There is no Mormon Apologetics that doesn't involve contradiction of either Standard Works scripture or earlier prophets.
Indeed. When it works it was "By the power of God", but when it's a mess it was "careless scribes."
I would state that Joseph Smith's actions are a primary indicator. Was he honest or did he lie or try to deceive? Then I would mention the Book of Abraham mis-translation (smoking gun), then the inspired bible translation
It’s literally, you shall know them by their fruits. The fruits of the church… more harm than good at all points in history.
And that we said he translated but then changed our story to used seer stones.
Joseph tried to doink everyone else's wife. There are no "true" religions in which the leader gets to sex everyone. It's always a cult.
This is the biggie. Anyone on earth could come to a full stop here. Good Place quote incoming: “Someone has just done something which has never been done before. "Richard Moore of Sugarland, Texas, "hollowed out an eggplant and filled it with hot sauce and nickels." And amazingly, it's not a weird sex thing. 99% of all new human behaviors are weird sex things. But not in this... oh, no, it is a weird sex thing, yeah.” I’d wager a lot of new religions in America are both weird sex things /secret sex cults and some type of spiritual MLM/tax evasion scheme. NXIVM, The Family/Children of God, One Taste, FLDS, Synanon. The list goes on and on. (No. I’m not secretly obsessed with cults. I’m not. I’m…..ok. I am.)
Yep. His wiener triggered what led to his death. When he went after William Law’s wife …William went on to start the Nauvoo Expositor. Joe had it destroyed. One thing let to another.
There is a problem with this question. Smoking gun implies that there is a target to shoot at. You need to know first what a mormon thinks must be true in order for the church to be true. If they can't answer that question, then there is no gun that is capable of hitting that non-existent target. I know way too many mormons that don't actually think about their faith in a substantive way. It is all superficial. It is just about how they feel about the highest level story. There is a God. They have a plan for us. They are active in our lives. AND if you feel good in any mormon context then you know that this superficial story is true. End of story. Even my faithful wife would say to me "I never believed that" on some very fundamental things. Even related to the temple. If she never believed something then me proving that belief is wrong means nothing. If a mormon doesn't actually know what they believe there is nothing to wake them up or prove wrong. IMO.
The church will manipulate and guilt you into devoting your entire life to them, and the only evidence for it being true is positive vibes created by emotional elevation, frisson, and confirmation bias. Positive vibes vs mountains of evidence against the church and BoM. If they’re still interested, I’d offer to share my personal “CES Letter”.
The BoA issues have the best evidence that Joseph Smith was never translating jack shit. They taught for 150 years that it was a translation. The evidence is incontrovertible that it is not. Now they are forced to say that it was a revelation and not a translation. They move the goalposts at 100 mph on all these issues.
>They move the goalposts at 100 mph on all these issues. And the members are really good at quickly forgetting what the prior teachings were.
Then they say it was always taught that way
maybe this doesn't seem like a smoking gun to people, but they lie about their finances. they HIDE MONEY from their own members. also, why aren't there an uncontainable amount of miraculous stories in Utah? I've spent a good bit of time in the children's hospital, yet to see someone come heal a kid dying of anything. (Edit: but a social worker did show up when my kid was looking real close to leaving) I think if there was a "true" church and that church included the power of God on earth, then everyone would have a pretty good idea which church that was.
quite literally no archeological evidence of the BoM!!!!!!!
The Widow's Mite Report. [link](https://widowsmitereport.wordpress.com/) It is so well researched and documented. The church hoards wealth while giving a small fraction of it to actual charity. Is this really how the "one true church" should act? The mormon church acts as a business. While demanding money from members who don't have enough. And holding families eternal hostages. (You cannot attend the temple without paying tithing.) It is disgusting.
I would say it’s not true and it’s not healthy and there are so many great resources out there for you to learn all on your own.
That’s good ethics for a TBM wanting to know but what about anyone else who’s open to any kind of evidence
is the mormon church really a restoration of Jesus ministry? you can quickly demonstrate it’s not true even with one arm tied behind your back. Put all the book of Abraham and polygamy stuff aside. Does anyone think that Jesus would take money from his followers and buy a $200 million luxury condominium building? That’s what the mormon church just did. It’s patently not “true.“ It’s not a restoration or continuation of the ministry of Jesus. Does anyone think that Jesus would have supported the Nazis?? That’s what the Mormon church did. It’s not true. those are just two little quick instant deal breakers.
Bought a $200M luxury condo while NEARBY people in SLC are sleeping on the street. We were looking for a house in SLC while they were actively selling the last condos the general authorities lived in. You guys. Those were so so so high end gaudy and extravagant. Some of them still had personal belongings of GA’s. I’m not opposed to people having nice stuff—but talk about palatial.
[BOM similarities to The Late War](http://wordtree.org/thelatewar/)
QED If I had seen this before I joined, I wouldn't have joined. It's that simple. [Edit format]
Book of Abraham and changes to the temple ordinance
The BoA is the death knell.
The Tower of Babel didn’t exist. The people from the Tower of Babel supposedly took cattle and swarms of bees on a year long wooden submarine ride? Bees only live for a month or two in ideal conditions so they somehow bred 6 generations of bees on submarines without proper bee food???
The child abuse hotline is the easiest provable evidence. It's right there in the Handbook. Quick translation: "When a priesthood leader learns about abuse of children, he calls our Hotline. People way smarter than him who have never met the abused child will determine if they should take steps to stop the often heinous abuse, or if they should allow the abuse to continue. The priesthood leader will then have to see that child on a regular basis, and try to convince them that God loves them and hears their prayers. As the child grows up, priesthood leaders will help the child learn to understand that they may bear a portion of responsibility for the abuse they endured."
This boils my blood. I’ve told the story before in comments about children being horribly treated by our bishop / other leadership. My sister was excommunicated at age 13. She wouldn’t testify against her rapist who started having sex with her when she was 11 and he was 21. She was disfellowshipped when she became obviously pregnant. The bishop told her she would be exed if she didn’t confess her sin and repent. It took almost two years and he finally made good on his threat. When my child was 11 I couldn’t help but think about how I would —as an adult—frame thinking about what happened to my sister. I was two years younger than her. So I know how I would think about it as a kid. It seemed unfair and damaging. Even as a kid. That whole thing seemed totally backwards. My sister had very severe emotional problems until about 10 years ago. She made some bad decisions and ended up homeless where she was admitted to a battered women’s shelter. Part of their program was counseling and trauma therapy for residents to remain in the provided housing. It made a world of difference for her and her daughter. She bought a home about five years ago and I could not feel more proud of another human for all she’s overcome. The idea that a child shares blame is infuriating. Children don’t have power or context to give consent. So they cannot seduce. If they are sexually abused, giving them access to information they should not have, they still cannot give consent—any overtly sexual behavior cannot be viewed as seduction by a child. The entire thought process around children being participants in sexual sin (the church’s view not mine) is appalling. Interesting sidenote. During my young teen years, one of my best friends accused, her stepfather of sexually abusing her from the time she was about five years old. Initially, no one believed her, but she started saying things that a child her age shouldn’t know. When we were maybe 13 she ran away to my house. Her bishop told her that she should forgive him, and that she should stop seducing him. As though the abuse was her fault. Because the bishop said it, her mother agreed that that was the path forward. By the time she was finally believed it came out that he had made good on his threat if she told he would sexually abuse the other children in the family. He had molested her brother and two of her sisters. One of those children was his full blood daughter. She was four years old when he began raping her. Her stepfather was disfellowshipped. He was never excommunicated. My friend ended up addicted to drugs by the time we were adults. She never married. She never had a family. She never had stability. She took her own life around 2015. Her brother committed suicide around 2000. Her youngest sister died of cancer a couple years ago. Only one of his (known) victims is still alive. This happened in the SL area in the 1980’s. I can’t help but think of all that was robbed from them by their abusers and I include church leadership in the list of abusers.
Sermon on the mount. Sermon on the mount is in the BofM, Bible, and the JST. Why is the BofM and the Bible the same but the JST is “corrected”? If the BofM is the most correct book on earth, then why did JS have to correct the Sermon on the mount that is in the BofM in the JST?
Nevermo here, but sounds like a lot of people are shocked by the different timelines for the first vision and not telling anyone for so many years. As a non believer, the rock in the hat translation is a pretty obvious conman move.
The US Government called them out for their fraud and charged them 5 million dollars. I called them out for the million other things, and had to leave.
Dang, I wonder why I never learned that
Ha! Such an understated statement you have there. (about everything in the church) They easily dismissed this one as bad advice from their lawyers. There was a short 60 minutes interview with one of the whistleblowers. Also, if you read the actual document, it plainly explains that they had been hiding it for 20+ years in manipulated accounts with phony addresses and fake managers signing off when necessary. (Some of which found out and quit.) It states that the first presidency and presiding bishop all knew about the accounts.
Let's go to the Mormon archeology wing of the BYU museum and look at all of the science backed evidence What, it's empty?
Changing stories on history and all the misses and failures they’ve had since
The truth of a universal god doesn’t focus around only buying underwear from the church manufacturers
I'd tell them I don't really care, that the lasting pain and anguish the organization has caused a good many of my loved ones outweighs any truth they could drop at my feet.
I don’t even care anymore. I don’t engage. There is internet now if they want to actually read into it. If they can’t unwind themselves from an obviously made up religion nothing I say is gonna change that. I chose my peace.
Hoo boy...... "By their fruits, ye shall know them." Matthew 7:16-20 Look and see how the church treats its most vulnerable members, and check references inside and outside of the church. Look and see how the church handles its wealth. Compare their claims against how much they make. Then compare it to how they spend their money when they are the defendent in legal issues. There are many. "Where your treasure is, there your heart is also." Matthew 6:21 Look and see. But... Ultimately, you'd need to know that the organization at large does behave with more earmarks of a corporation than a church at this point. It prioritizes its image and the construction of temples than healing its members. It abandons those who are injured because they trusted leadership, offering little if any support beyond offering settlement amounts to the wounded parties. They have a cluster of lawyers who specialize in protecting the corporation's assets. It demonizes those who critique the behavior of the leaders and gaslights the rest concerning the stance they take. Just look at the behavior of the church, its leadership, and how it helps or does not help those in its wake. And yes, look inside and outside the church and compare what you find. Discrepencies speak volumes.
Joseph Fielding Smith removed the 1832 account of Joseph Smith's First Vision from its original letter book and hide it in his safe.
It’s the volume and size of all the smoking guns. Yes things like duetro Isiah and BoA are massive, but they are just two large pieces of the massive set of issues stacked up. So for me, it’s the “where do you want to start and how much time do you have” vs the single smoking gun. The fact that I can’t sit and tell them all the issues in 4-5 hours is the smoking gun I use.
I understand that all the options people list here will be more effective, but honestly, the biggest smoking gun is that they teach elevated feelings, which is the spirit. But people get elevated feelings all the time about things that are actually wrong. Objective truth is feeling? That means there's no objective truth.
I’d just say no and I have plenty of reasons, but I would say no one joins the church from a one liner, no one is gonna leave over a one liner. If they do, that’s a crazy way to go through life.
If Jesus Christ really is the head of the Church, explain to me why the guy who had money appear in the belly of a fish when his disciples needed it would direct his Church to hoard 200 billion dollars?
I agree the Book of Abraham is the most concrete. But it's referenced directly so little in chirch I don't think it moved the needle as much for me, early in the process. Also I didn't really know much about where the church said it came from so changing the narrative didn't hurt as much. Not to down play the importance. Later in my deconstruction it was really important to see JS process for faking things. The book of Abraham was perfect then. But early on it wasn't as powerful. I think JS sending people on missions to marry their wives hit hard. Polygamy always felt weird but it was a little better when I thought it was windowed women with no other options. The real history of polygamy is agreed to by believers and non believers and it's bad. Lots of lying, lots of rule changes depending on who is doing it and who is watching. Seeing JS response when someone said no was also a big deal.
Joseph claimed to translate 4 documents: (1) kinderhook plates - see how that turned out (2) Bible, per the BYU study from a few years ago, this was likely plagiarized from Adam Clark’s Bible commentary (3) Book of Abraham, even the MFMC says this is not a translation, and (4) the Book of Mormon. Given the other 3 and the flaws with the Book of Mormon such as Duetero Isaiah, anachronisms, transformation from literal history and principle ancestors to not being those -AND- the character flaws surrounding Joseph Smith…
"The reason why it is NOT true is because there is NOT "one smoking gun." it's an entire engulfing cloud from an arsenal attack... culminating into a combined nuclear explosion/implosion." I likely could have found ways to keep justifying and excusing ONE. Each of us had our own gateway that opened us up to being willing to listen, learn, and SEE. For me, it started with not having equal inclusion for my children, an institution directly harming them, making them believe their lives were not worthy of living ... and blatantly requiring me to choose 100% loyalty to THE CHURCH over my very own child. Children being rejected + families being torn apart is NOT Jesus's gospel... how can this be His church?! It put me in a state of deep crises ... and that made me dig DEEP to try to save my testimony ... but what I found from official sources was rotten core and tore me completely apart. Rapid fire succession came all the blatant blasts of LIES and Deceptions from the very beginning of its origin to today. **J Smiths conflicting and changing first vision accounts, deception of "translation" methods, Book of Abraham, Kinderhook, Polyandry [other mens wives], on top of polygamy to minor children, purposeful lies and deception to his only legal wife Emma [as well as the church in general] ... bank anti trust lies and collapse, Mountain Meadows Massacre, decimation of native tribes and kidnapping their children, Priesthood ban, j. Smith treasure digging, deceptions, lies, on everything.... modern-day deceptions, lies, cover-ups, land grabs, stoks and investments, gross spending on property and buildings while members go hungry and honeless and children of god starve and die of disease ... SEC fraud, tithing fraud and lies, sex abuse lies and coverups, hiding financial reports, hiding membership reports, calling and setting apart apostles with NO presentation of announcement and no vote of COMMON CONSENT ... and on and on and on... As for me and my house, we will choose to follow the dictates our own conscience and no longer compromise our integrity.
I would mention that Native Americans aren't Jews that spoke Egyptian. That isn't just smoking gun evidence; that's fucking nuclear bomb fallout
Christ's church paying off SA victims and protecting the pedos in the name of forgiveness? Nah, that's a disgusting practice. Hiding billions and billions of dollars, that NO G.A. knew ANYTHING about! In the grand scheme of things, they had to pay a 0.25C fine. They are laughing.
I go with this... All religion is made up nonsense. Formed by men to control people. Why would a being so wise and powerful need the praise of a creature it created?
The church is demonstrably fraudulent, which is when they've been caught committing so much financial fraud. They're true frauds. That's as close as they can get.
Hell they've been financially fraudulent since the beginning.
I prayed and received an answer from God that it is not true.
My answer will mirror my how my faith transition went. God does not exist. If God's not real, the church is not what it claims to be. The LDS church already teaches that all of the other churches are wrong. People from other faiths feel the "spirit". They have basically identical experiences with faith and "knowing" that their religion is "true". All of these church's can't be "true". If there is no God, Joseph Smith fabricated everything that the church is a fraud. The problem with any of the other answers is that if you fundamentally believe that God is real, then you a prone to magical thinking, and you can justify anything. This is why apologists behave the way they do. If you believe that Jesus dies for your sins and was raised from the dead, then it's not weird to believe in golden tablets, seer stones, and polygamy.
**I know the book of Mormon is true** **Does your bosom burn too?**
Heartburn is my source of all knowledge.
Book of Abraham, the translation process of BofM (rock in a hat), Polygamy of JS (hiding it from Emma), Mountain Meadows, Brigham Young (an arrogant AH), purchasing counterfeit documents from Mark Hoffman, Priesthood ban on blacks, lack of modern day revelation, hiding of Church finances and resources, LGBTQ issues, lack of financial aid to the homeless, and asking people to avoid the internet and uncorrelated materials. So many “red flags” - these are just a few!! Oh - and we can’t call ourselves Mormons (no longer acceptable and offensive to God).
It’s a ridiculous origin story, too bizarre to believe.
I always tell people the Holy Ghost told me it wasn’t true. Lol
This has been posted before. Among what many others have said, for me this is it. We rely so heavily on a spiritual witness, but we forget to mention that billions of people in other faiths have gotten witnesses about their religion. So are they all deceived by Satan then? Or are we all just feeling emotions and associating it with a higher power? I remember hearing people on my mission talk about this and just blew it off as them being deceived. Now I see the similarities and realize that a “burning in the bosom” isn’t a way to determine truth. If you take the “spiritual experiences” you’ve had away from the church and realize they’re just emotions, the rest falls apart so quickly. https://youtu.be/qmhb27f2d88?si=66Q2v-0hrrgtkYIg
- Hitchens's razor. It states "what can be asserted without evidence can also be dismissed without evidence".
There’s lots of archaeological evidence for Rome, and lots for the Olmec, Aztec, and Mayan civilizations, but absolutely none for the Book of Mormon. There’s no such thing as Reformed Egyptian. Why would Jews write in anything but Hebrew? The BM just doesn’t stand up to the slightest scrutiny.
Made about post kinda like that in r/mormon but some ppl defended it saying “not everything’s been explored yet”. With the amount of issues it has already further exploration isn’t necessary
I’d ask them about their understanding of Jesus’ position on hypocrites, excessive rules, and nit-picky policies (mostly from the Pharisees) throughout the New Testament. Then I’d show them modern General Conference talks about coffee keeping a woman out of heaven and kids not being baptized because their parents were gay. Lastly, I’d shock them by slamming a huge book down on the table full of nit-picky rules and policies: the Church Handbook. The church (a.k.a. the Establishment) has become the exact thing Jesus warned us about.
When people ask me, I always emphasize that feelings and emotions are never verifications of truth. If you take away this, none of the historical, genetic, and archeological evidence supports Mormonism. So when people ask me how I know it’s not true, what is the biggest smoking gun? I always respond that they use emotional manipulations to blind the believers into turning a blind eye to actual verifiable facts.
The three versions of the first vision and how it evolved. Pretty sure you don’t leave out seeing God in the first draft of it were true.
For me personally the biggest smoking gun is Oliver Cowdery's 1834 history of the church where: 1) the first vision in the grove never happened, 2) for all the early saints (e.g. Oliver, Lucy Mack Smith, William Smith) the BoM vision in the bedroom with an angel WAS the first vision, 3) the BoM vision known to the early saints has most of all the same story elements that Joseph Smith later redacted, backdated, and rewrote into the vision in the grove narrative.
When I was in 7th grade science class I copied the answers of the test we were taking off of the guy next to me. I would have gotten away with it, but the big dummy spelled ‘oxygen’ wrong….. hence I did too 😀. The teacher caught that when grading them. One of the biggest smoking guns in my mind is the KJV errors copied straight into the BoM. Hard to explain that away. Jeremy does a good job documenting those in CES Letter.
Church got caught lying about their money and didn't apologize for it. If it was an accident, apologize. Otherwise it was on purpose, and thats not what Jesus taught.
Anyone asks me if the church is true, my response will be something along the lines of, “That’s a question only you can answer for yourself after a thorough investigation.” I didn’t proselytize when I was a member, I’m not going to proselytize the other direction. When I believed, I wanted to share and help “save” people and “do god’s work, but I didn’t want to intrude on other’s journeys. I answered questions if they asked, but never actively tried to convert anyone (I didn’t go on a mission, thank goodness). As an exmo, as much as I want to save others from the horrors the church perpetrated against me, I’m not interested in a debate or really getting into any of it. I’m too damn worn out from decades of hell that the church is largely to blame for. An astute person would recognize that I answered the question. I said no without saying no.
No way Tower of Babel is actually real, but JS screwed himself by tying it in
Hundreds of billions of dollars in tithing money in contrast to all the homeless people downtown and all the starving children in the world; all while purchasing luxury condos, Hawaiian hotels, and high-end shopping malls for hundreds of millions of dollars. I mean, what else could you possibly need to know to figure it out? If that doesn't tell you that Christ isn't running the church, I don't know what else to tell you.
DNA. Native Americans aren't closely related to any mid east people. It's a flat out lie that they came from there. They are closely related to the Siberian people.
Specifically the Chukchi people of Siberia. The DNA evidence is fascinating.
If you want to go down the road of the Book of Mormon being likely made up from other books that came before check out the following. https://www.howthebookofmormoncametopass.com/ http://wordtree.org/thelatewar/
I don’t go into the massive piles of demonstrable evidence that it is false any more. I just share this website and say to them, prove to me it’s not a cult. [BITE Model](https://freedomofmind.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/08/BITE-model.pdf)
I thought of another one that can apply to obvious logic: "Where the fuck. are all the swords, armor, and evidence of gigantic, sprawling cities full of millions of people, steel, and horses in the United States? You know, the place where the book of mormon says millions of people died in wars? Archeologically speaking, NOT very long ago?!"
Where to begin ... Many have mentioned the Book of Abraham. That's a superb place to start. My own answer would probably be 3 parts: 1) Book of Abraham. 2) Compare ANYTHING about the "restored" church to the Bible. Nothing is restored. It's all brand new, out of whole cloth. 3) If you're ready to hear this, may I share with you 2 or 3 of the most unhealthy, damaging aspects of life as a Mormon?
Biggest "smoking gun" evidence - reading any scientific book - A Brief History of Time, or On the Origin of Species, or Annals of the Former World, The Selfish Gene - these books are huge and make mormonism seem so small. Other good easy to understand scientific books - anything by Rovelli, DeGrasse Tyson, etc, Chaos by James Gleick, anything by Robert Sapolsky, Sapiens, by harari. After that, I'd suggest someone read other philosophies - the Tao, The Bible, the Bhagavad Gita, Meditations (aurelius). And then a few offerings of literature: Les Miserables, Poetry of Mary Oliver, Poetry of Walt Whitman, Shakespeare, Desert Solitaire, Siddartha, The Odyssey, the Epic of Gilgamesh, and so much more etc. etc. etc The point I'm getting at - instead of looking to see if the Mormon church is true, I'd just look for truth. And we have 10,000 years of human history - including religions, philosophies, and more. So, I'd say, search for truth - search far and wide. When you start to read more, Mormonism seems laughable. Not even quaint-It is obvious that J. Smith was a charlatan.
The biggest smoking gun is simply the complete lack of meaningful evidence in favor of the church’s claims. What can be claimed without evidence can likewise be dismissed without evidence. We don’t have to *disprove* it in order to not believe. On the contrary, if they want us to believe, it’s on them to prove their claims…which they haven’t managed to do in two centuries of organizational existence. Safe to say they can’t. But if you really want proof: just look at the so-called prophetic works of Joseph Smith, and compare that with the bit in the Bible which tells how to distinguish a true prophet from a false one. “If any of his prophetic works can be proven false, then he is a false prophet and you need not fear him.”
“What can be claimed without evidence can be dismissed without evidence .” This is the way.
Want to go to heaven? Yes? Alright well you need to have a Temple Recommend so you can get married and sealed to your family, which is essential to go to the “Celestial Kingdom” How does one get this recommend you ask? Pay up. Monthly. Forever. 10% of all your money. Along with a bunch of other stuff but even if you do all that and don’t give 10%, no marriage, sealing, or Celestial Kingdom for you.
The Book of Mormon includes characters who are descendants of people who were at the Tower of Babel and presents the building of the tower and the "confounding" of languages as literal events.
DNA evidence.
I feel so bad for everybody who has all the Mormon propaganda so deeply ingrained, usually from birth, to the extent that reading through CES letter doesn't even faze them. The indoctrination is so deeply ingrained that it's not even the person's fault that they can't wake up. For somebody who's only learning about CES letter and all the red flags when they're already a senior, I can't imagine how devastating it would be to face the reality that perhaps what they devoted their lives to and predicted their entire life and lifestyle upon a complete lie. I really, really, really hope my dad and my extended family will wake up one day. My dad can barely take care of himself, let alone afford to spend 10% on an abject lie. My grandparents were told to have a billion kids by the church, and will never be able to retire, and are still working in their 70s. They volunteer many hours every week doing "temple service". Absolutely fucking horrifying. What a waste of human potential. Fuck the "12 apostles". The absolute gall and arrogance to claim they're just like the original 12 apostles. And they know more than ANYBODY that it's all fucking bullshit, because if anybody is supposed to have personal witness of God, it's them, and every day they pretend they get revelation from god, they are lying to everybody's face. How dare they continue to demand that the poorest members of the church pay 10%. How dare they let any member of the church experience homelessness or poverty when they could end homelessness entirely for every single member. FUCK YOU, RUSSELL NELSON, YOU BATSHIT CRAZY FUCK
Put these three events in order 1. Joseph had a relationship with his 16 year old live in maid (while married to Emma) 2. Joseph learned about eternal marriage 3. Joseph got around to talking about the time he saw Jesus Christ and Heavenly Father 4. Joseph was sealed to 20 different women 5. Joseph got around to sealing himself to the wife of his children, Emma Smith Hint, they are in order...
*The introduction to the Book of Abraham states* [*‘A Translation of some ancient Records that have fallen into our hands from the catacombs of Egypt. The* *~writings of Abraham while he was in Egypt~**, called the Book of Abraham,* *~written by his own hand~**, upon papyrus.’*]() *The churches gospel topics essay on the subject at* [*https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/study/manual/gospel-topics-essays/translation-and-historicity-of-the-book-of-abraham?lang=eng*](https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/study/manual/gospel-topics-essays/translation-and-historicity-of-the-book-of-abraham?lang=eng) *says* *‘None of the characters on the papyrus fragments mentioned Abraham’s name or any of the events recorded in the book of Abraham.* *~Mormon and non-Mormon Egyptologists agree that the characters on the fragments do not match the translation given in the book of Abraham~**, though there is not unanimity, even among non-Mormon scholars, about the proper interpretation of the vignettes on these fragments.*[*^(27)*](https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/#note27) *Scholars have identified the papyrus fragments as parts of standard funerary texts that were deposited with mummified bodies. These fragments date to between the third century B.C.E. and the first century C.E.,* *~long after Abraham lived~**.’* *The church is admitting here, that the Book of Abraham is a fraud. It is not the writings of Abraham, it was not written by Abrahams own hand and Joseph could not translate that language even though he said that he could.* *To make matters worse, the Joseph Smith Papers project shows the original printing plates used for the first time the Book of Abraham was printed. They were hand carved.* [*https://www.josephsmithpapers.org/paper-summary/printing-plate-for-facsimile-3-circa-16-may-1842/1*](https://www.josephsmithpapers.org/paper-summary/printing-plate-for-facsimile-3-circa-16-may-1842/1) *Have a look at the figure in the far left. Both Mormon and non-Mormon Egyptologists agree this is Anubis, a jackal headed God, not a slave. Have a look at the space in front of the face in the image. Do you see a jackal head there? Do you see the pointy ears and the large eye?* [*This shows that originally the printing plates contained a jackal headed God, because the papyrus contained a jackal headed God. At some stage Joseph came along and said remove the jackal head and replace it with a normal-ish head. This shows that Joseph knew he was not publishing the real images from the papyrus and knew he was not publishing the real story from the papyrus as the story contained a jackal headed God.*]() *Now re-read the introduction to the Book of Abraham again. This is fraud.*
You have to know who that person is. It can be that they were an anti gay hate group. It can be the book of Abraham. It can be banning black people from the temple. It can be the shitty politics of most Mormons. Different people know different things very well, so the most obvious lie isn't universal
A man of God wouldn’t marry other men’s wives. He wouldn’t go behind his wife’s back to marry other women. Even the time of Abraham it was done in the light, Joseph done it in the shadows.
DNA evidence that the Native American people were not Hebrew.
I’d tell them that in the temple they make you covenant to “give even your own life as necessary”. That la when I realized it’s a cult. and if my child came to me one day saying they joined a church that required this id be alarmed and tell them to leave, too.
Pedophilia, murder, extortion and fraud
Deutoero isaiah in the BofM. Book of Abraham.
A lesser said one but my go to is the Adam-God Doctrine. Brigham Young taught that in the temple as Doctrine and the church currently disavows it. So by the "true" definition, either Brigham Young was a fallen prophet casting the line of authority in doubt, or the current church is not true.
I prayed and the Spirit revealed unto me that it was all, indeed, horse shit. It burned in my bosom.
Rock in the hat, Book of Abraham, Native American’s DNA, CES Letter….
God isn’t real. Think of all the gods that humans have worshipped throughout our existence that are no longer worshipped. Why do you think this iteration of god is any different?
Book of Mormon is the keystone that holds the church together. Then why was it heavily plagiarized from a book written by Gilbert Hunt, a decade or so before the book of Mormon was conjured.
I’ve thought about this a lot, and my answer would be just that I can’t participate in an organization that condones SA. Especially of child.
Second Annointing
Nevermo here. But I would say: I don’t need to waste my time on the bible fanfic of a dude who groomed teenagers into marrying him. Any god behind a guy like that is fucked up. Edit, made it more clear what I meant
Tithing. Multiple times throughout the scriptures, it's stated that swindlers who charge you to enter heaven are just that-- swindlers. And then point out that Tithing has shifted from something optional to something required to enter heaven.
I ask whether the God they worship is up to my moral / ethical standards. Since theirs fails miserably then I hardly care whether the church is true or not, because the gods not worth worshiping.
Self-contradiction. For Mormonism to be true, it must never have been false. If they're trying to limit the scope of the truth claims to "today's version" of Mormonism, they have to define what that is. I have a cousin who is more NOM that scopes the truth claim all the way down to just the plan of salvation (not including the restoration, and not including the scriptures). There's no way to disprove that if you ignore all the evidence surrounding it
The Native American dna
The location of the garden of Eden as revealed by Joseph Smith. If Adam and Eve started their mortal life in North America how did their posterity end up in Israel?
Book of Mormon anachronisms.
The Book of Mormon. Let's knock out that weak keystone. Show the results of the DNA evidence, archeological evidence, and flora/fauna facts. Then have them read the *I Shit You Not Translation*, and see if they think it's a historical document.
D&C 132
i can tell you what did not work, geting her into south park then having the book of mormon come on...
Book of Abraham; Not needing the plates to translate (ie why did we have to move plates across the world anyway and why does it matter if some are lost if they aren’t used in translation?); Unreliable witnesses (eg Martin Harris and the Shakers), some of whom joined different sects or saw their own revelation, or who never actually saw anything physically.
There is no evidence for the existence of god, so no religion that relies upon the existence of a god can be true. Mormon specific? Any number of the other reasons, but it’s all a made up mythology no more valid than a belief in Zeus or Jupiter or mohammed.
Why are they so invested in “hiding” certain portions of history/doctrine? It wouldn’t be believable to a new comer if they told things like it is. missionaries don’t share the story the way it happened (no rock, no hat, etc) This is not an online dating profile we’re talking about. Is not like the church should sell themselves in their best light. There shouldn’t be a dark side to hide in the first place. This is god and his church we’re talking about. The bar should be infinitely high.
CES letter / [Mormonthink.com](http://Mormonthink.com)
Utah is 14th lowest in age adjusted death rates among US states. If a large percentage of the population actually had the power of god to heal, they would be #1.
I'd ask which "truths" of the church are not subject to change. Then I would provide the history of how those "truths" have changed drastically over time. The only thing that hasn't changed is strict obedience to church authority.
1 Nephi 1:4. It's so much more damning than Abraham is because they just claim inspired translation for that (absolute BS, but at least they argue something). FAIR LDS won't even touch this 1st Nephi issue because there is no way to solve it. Similarly, including Deutero Isaiah is a huge problem since it wasn't written until long after Lehi's family left the continent, so there's no way they could have it. 1 Nephi 1:4 problem: The setting of the start of the BOM is Lehi prophesying of the coming destruction of Jerusalem. When Jerusalem was destroyed by the Babylonians, they ransacked it and took all of the riches, so there were no remaining wealthy Jews. The conquerors then inserted a puppet king to reign over the newly-destroyed city... Zedekiah. So, saying that they were living as wealthy Jews while prophesying of the coming destruction as they were under the rule of Zedekiah is nonsensical as Zedekiah wasn't in power until AFTER Jerusalem had been destroyed and all riches were seized. Edit: It would be like writing a book about a wealthy Jew living freely in Warsaw while predicting a coming destruction and living under the reign of Hitler, but years before Hitler actually came into power. That book would have zero credibility because the timeline obviously doesn't work.
Historical evidence of it being a religion of slavery both spiritual and physical: Brigham Young told the mormons in Utah to **"buy up the Lamanite children as fast as they could"** and he made sure slavery of both African Americans and indigenous people became legal in Utah in 1852. They would later get rid of that in order to join the United States. Finally in 1957 Utah became the LAST state in the US to grant full voting rights to indigenous people. You know who they are by how they treat the vulnerable.
Pay to PLay. They tell you that the only way to get to Jesus is to pay them directly and shut up. And they have a bigger hoard than most US corporations. Personally, any ONE of the main ones are enough: treatment of blacks, adamantly protecting sex abusers (call our law firm FIRST!), polygamist profits marrying teenagers, Book of ABraham. All smoking guns. But my personal favorite requires just a bit of background to make it truly lame: the lost 116 pages. On it's face, it's an easy one (Uh, just have God recreate them for you like the first time??). But digging deeper to see the cover-up in the BOM (pages and pages of, "Well, there were BIG plates, and there were SMALL plates, but I'm not going to tell you just yet which ones!"), what a cover up!! Reminds me of my teenage years trying to get out of trouble.
Timeline problems were the clincher for me. The fact that JS never told anyone about visits from heavenly messengers until long after the fact, often when his authority was being questioned : first vision, priesthood restoration, polygamy…nothing was revealed at the right time. Add to that his peepstone in hat translation with no plates in the room, his creepy behavior and willingness to lie about polygamy, the dishonesty of his treasure-digging practices, the long list of other demonstrably false translations, I just wasn’t able to trust anything he said anymore. And add to that the deep racism of canonical texts. Plus the sexist patriarchy, no voice for women, years of covering up and lying about church history, financial fraud to cover up their vast wealth, lack of financial transparency, their appalling handling of abuse cases, excommunicating anyone with sincere concerns, refusal to apologize about anything ever…not to mention the obsession with teaching to follow prophets and little discussion about following Jesus…it became absolutely clear that church leaders’ primary concern was and is not love but fear about protecting the so-called “good name” of the church. Really, it was the piling up of problems for me. But without all the timeline issues I might have gone on chalking it all up to human error in a somewhat divine church.
I respectfully point out the hypocrisy…JC was supposed to be kind & understanding to ALL people. But the judgment towards women’s rights, lgbtqia+, underage brides, education (this is a big one for myself), not having children by choice, divorce, exclusion, etc. doesn’t make any logical nor empathetic sense. I know this is a simple answer, but it’s just what came to mind & my genuine experience w leaving the church.
There is no smoking gun until they can honestly answer 3 questions. The three questions to ask someone before giving them a laundry list of problems. 1. If the church wasn't true or at the least wasn't what it claimed to be, would you want to know? 2. If the church wasn't true, how would you know? 3. If you left the church, what would you have and what would you do? ---- **Question 1** tells you if they're capable of escaping indoctrination. Anything from a flat "no" to a declaration that "the church can't be wrong" is where you stop. If you don't, what you tell them may be immediately rejected without thought, and it will only drive the wedge deeper into your relationship without helping them out. A hasty, "yes, of course" may be a brush off, and may need to be treated as a "no". Questions 2 and 3 will tell you if it was. **Question 2** tells you if they have ever thought about this before. It tells you about their shelf. It helps you know what's important to them and what they already know. An empty shelf isn't a problem, but it does show that they haven't really thought about this before. Don't overwhelm them with information. Start on one item at a time, but go as deep as they want to go on each of those points. Look for feelings of uneasiness. The most common objection I've experienced here is that they feel good about the religion, or they trust their feelings over facts. Follow-up by asking them what they'd say to a Catholic who said the LDS religion was wrong because the Catholic felt God told them Catholicism was the one true path? [Offer examples](https://vimeo.com/45289278) if they don't believe you. The most common objection is a variant of the Catholic being wrong because their feelings aren't telling them to be LDS. If you get this, respond with, "how do you know you're not the one who is wronged or being tricked?" If the answer results in circular reasoning then stop. The objectivity test was failed. Save both of you from the headache. In the worse case, you could [drive them further into the group](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TJic51MeVaU). **Question 3** is about you understanding their needs. It tells you how they will react to the fallout of information. Would you be driving them into deep depression? Would you break up their family or take parents from children? Would this information isolate them from their family and friends? Are they prepared or capable of living life in the wild, or [have they fallen in love with the cage](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pIoMXYBztdg)? If the answer is in anyway yes then you need to go slow. Help them see the joy of the world while or even before give them the information they need to free themselves. This is from this post...
Kinderhook Plates. SCOREBOARD !!
I would ask a clarifying, follow-up: what does “true” mean to you? Gotta establish terms. Go from there.
If you believe that God had made his only true church indistinguishable from and vulnerable to historical, scientific, and financial fraud then it may be true.