🎣 Kinderhook Plates¶
Estimated time to read: 8 minutes
Gospel Topics Essay¶
The church does have a Gospel Topics Essay about this. Contemporary records are pretty sparse, and I assume it's because it doesn't end well.
In 1843, a group of men unearthed six bell-shaped brass plates about three inches in height from an American Indian burial mound near Kinderhook, Illinois. The plates contained symbols resembling an ancient script, and one member of the group thought the artifacts appeared well suited for Joseph Smith to translate. Accounts suggest the discovery intrigued Joseph Smith and other Latter-day Saints in Illinois, but no translated text resulted from this short-lived excitement.
One of those present when the plates were unearthed later reported that he had learned the whole episode was a prank. . . . [A] local blacksmith forged the plates and deposited them in the burial mound the night before the discovery. Chemical and metallurgical analysis of the one surviving plate confirms the artifact was not an ancient production. Moreover, the characters on the plates do not match any known language and were likely invented[.]
"Turned out to all be fake. Joseph was just casually intrigued, but since we don't have any translated text, we can put this to bed and all go home to our families now"
I don't think he is one to back down from a chance to prove his translation abilities... even if the source material is fabricated.
Joseph apparently examined the plates and . . . remarked that they contained “the history of … a descendant of Ham through the loins of Pharaoh king of Egypt.” Joseph evidently did not attempt a revelatory translation as he had done with the Book of Mormon plates, but rather appears to have compared the symbols on the Kinderhook plates with other ancient artifacts in his possession.
now wait just a damned minute there
Joseph didn't translate anything, but could confidently say that it's a history of a descendant of Ham through Pharaoh. He did not try translating it through (and I cannot emphasize this enough) the "revelatory translation as he had done with the Book of Mormon."
Which of the following is that process?
- Seer stone in a hat
- Transliteration from Moroni's plates
- Urim & Thummim, with Moroni's plates
- Just prayer and revelation
Because it appears that Joseph did... I don't know, maybe all of these methods? So we have a fifth methodology that was not used on the Kinderhook plates that gave us the summary and subject matter?
He is on record as having examined them and making claims about what they mean. If we were to expand that ellipsis, the direct quote sure sounds like Joseph did accept these plates as authentic and even claimed that he had translated a portion of them:
Monday, May, 1— I insert fac similes of the six brass plates , found near Kinderhook, in Pike Co. Illinois, on April 23 by Mr. Robert Wiley & others while excavating a large mound. They found a skeleton about 6 feet from the surface of the Earth, which must have stood 9 feet high. The plates were found on the breast of the Skeleton, and were covered with ancient characters
I have translated a portion of them, and find they contain the history of the person with whom they were found. He was a descendant of Ham, through the loins of Pharoah, King of Egypt, and that he received his kingdom from the ruler of Heaven and Earth.
— History, 1838–1856, volume D-1 [1 August 1842–1 July 1843] The Joseph Smith Papers (see also History of the Church, vol. 5 page 372; also UTLM's notes)
"I have translated a portion of them" can somehow be interpreted as "Joseph didn't entertain the thought of translating them," Right. Cool. Okay.
What's this? The "person with whom they were found"? We'll just drive right by that? There was a dead body with the plates that were demonstrated to be a fabrication? Did this prank cost someone their life? Or were they desecrated remains of someone who had passed decades prior? What happened to the body, that reportedly stood 9 feet tall? A kingdom from the ruler of heaven? What in the goddamn is an Egyptian royal descendant doing in rural Illinois, with an engraved history of his life? What kingdom?
How did the prophet of the restoration fall for this? We have "no translated text" from the ordeal, though, so I guess it's a non-issue. 🙄
Has the church tried to distance themselves from this? ... Would it surprise you if they used weasel words, along the lines of "no translated text" suggesting that no attempt of translation was ever done?
Ensign¶
Here are some excerpts from Kinderhook Plates Brought to Joseph Smith Appear to Be a Nineteenth-Century Hoax, Stanley B. Kimball, Ensign, August 1981.
. . . a nineteenth-century attempt to lure Joseph Smith into making a translation of ancient-looking characters that had been etched into the plates.
Joseph Smith did not make the hoped-for translation. In fact, no evidence exists that he manifested any further interest in the plates after early examination of them, although some members of the Church hoped that they would prove to be significant. But the plates never did.
. . .
A month and a half later the Nauvoo Neighbor press published a 12″ x 15″ broadside entitled Discovery of the Brass Plates. . . . This handbill contained a reprint of the Times and Seasons story, with the addition of facsimiles of all twelve sides of the six plates. Nothing further regarding the Prophet’s opinion of the plates appeared on the broadside—only a statement that “the contents of the plates … will be published in the ‘Times and Seasons,’ as soon as the translation is completed.”
As soon as the translation is completed, you say? Does that mean the translation process had begun?
Also, the facsimiles of the plates appear to have been published. If the source material for a translation is readily available, like being published in a news press, and then viewers can examine the finished product, questions might arise. Uncomfortable questions. Folks who might try to independently reproduce those results.
Although this account appears to be the writing of Joseph Smith, it is actually an excerpt from a journal of William Clayton. It has been well known that the serialized “History of Joseph Smith” consists largely of items from other persons’ personal journals and other sources, collected during Joseph Smith’s lifetime and continued after the Saints were in Utah, then edited and pieced together to form a history of the Prophet’s life “in his own words.”
Oh. How convenient. Joseph's mention of starting to translate the prank-plates wasn't even Joseph writing it. In fact, it's clearly so far displaced from Joseph, that this preposterous accusation doesn't even need a gospel topics essay to defend it. It has been well known, as Stanley Kimball states, that the History of Joseph Smith isn't actually about Joseph Smith. You know, following the trend that the kids are into nowadays when they write a biography and it isn't about who's on the cover, or named in the title. Fortunately for us, we live in [current year], so we can look into that claim.
History of the Church¶
In the last number I gave a brief history of the rise and progress of the Church, I now enter more particularly into that history, and extract from my journal. - Joseph Smith
— “History of Joseph Smith”, p. 726, The Joseph Smith Papers, accessed June 10, 2024, https://www.josephsmithpapers.org/paper-summary/history-of-joseph-smith/1
Are we thinking of a different "history of Joseph Smith"?
History of the Church* (cited as HC) (originally entitled History of Joseph Smith; first published under the title* History of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints; nicknamed Documentary History of the Church or DHC) is a semi-official history of the early Latter Day Saint movement during the lifetime of founder Joseph Smith.
. . .
. . . The parts of the work attributed to Smith were either dictated by Smith to a scribe or consist of a secretary or historian independently outlining Smith's activities and statements for a given time period. Much of the writing occurred after Smith's death in 1844.
— History of the Church (book), Wikipedia
The article then lists numerous contributors to the document— 20 of them, by my count. William Clayton is, in fact, in that list, as a scribal author. The article also goes on to share this spicy bit of information:
Jerald and Sandra Tanner have alleged that when History of the Church is compared to the original manuscripts from which it is drawn, "more than 62,000 words" can be identified that were either added or deleted. One response to these charges points out that the methods used in creating History of the Church—while flawed by today's standards—were not uncommon practices in the nineteenth century, even by reputable historians.
Boy, where have I heard that justification before?
"It's fine, we just removed parts of the history and added some fabrication. What's the big deal? People used to do that all the time 200 years ago!"
🤨
No translated text resulted from the Kinderhook plates, though. Nothing to see here!