📚 Literary Value¶
Estimated time to read: 7 minutes
And there were some who died with fevers, which at some seasons of the year were very frequent in the land—but not so much so with fevers, because of the excellent qualities of the many plants and roots which God had prepared to remove the cause of diseases, to which men were subject by the nature of the climate—
But there were many who died with old age; and those who died in the faith of Christ are happy in him, as we must needs suppose.
Verses 37 - 41 better illustrate my point here, but that's a lengthy excerpt.
And thus did the thirty and eighth year pass away, and also the thirty and ninth, and forty and first, and the forty and second, yea, even until forty and nine years had passed away, and also the fifty and first, and the fifty and second; yea, and even until fifty and nine years had passed away.
Does this sound divinely inspired to you? Does this sound like an abridgment by the prophet Mormon, to distill the needed information written for our day?
Those two excerpts are rambling so incoherently that they sound like the stories I tried writing as a ten-year-old. No, I won't share those stories to prove my claim 😳
Seminary¶
In my year of studying the Book of Mormon as a seminary student, I recall numerous times that the instructor would pause to wonder aloud at how divinely appointed this text is. "Joseph Smith could never have written this book on his own!" Right, but that wasn't a relevant consideration until you brought it up. Admittedly, being a sleep-deprived teenager wasn't conducive to critical evaluation, so I didn't push back. "The Book of Mormon describes culture, history, economics, faith diversity, fashion, agriculture, and so many other markers that some uneducated farm kid wouldn't have ever thought of!"
Half-awake later that afternoon, I had time to reflect on what I had been told, and had the realization that there are no interwoven stories in here. There aren't twists and turns that hold your attention. If it was a compelling read by its own merit, we wouldn't have to be compelled by church leadership to read it daily (1, 2, 3, 4). If it were published and presented as a work of fiction, I don't think it would have held much value as historical literature. It really sounds like a story that is being dictated. There's so much repetition, there are chapters that span decades with absolutely nothing noteworthy happening in the interim. It feels like someone needed the story to move along quicker to reach temporal milestones.
Character¶
To be clear, "character" does not require fiction. I'm not trying to say that scriptural figures are fictional—not here, anyway.
There are numerous characters in the bible of varying complexity. What makes many of them compelling is that they are morally grey—meaning that they do both good and bad things, much like how tangible humans do. No human is 100% good or bad. People make mistakes, and people grow, mature, and develop their sense of purpose and morality over time. Compelling characters in fiction have measurable progress as the story changes them. Think back to historical people you've read about: USA's founding fathers, John Brown,
Economy¶
The idea that the Book of Mormon's economical structure as a proof of legitimacy is... it's really something isn't it? Looking in the scripture's index entry for Money, Nephite we see one (1) citation in Alma 11:4-19. And never again are any of these currencies mentioned.
In fact, pick any three of the currencies and do a search on the church's website for them.
- Limnah: Alma 11; and also King Limhi
- Ezrom: Alma 11; Zeezrom; or Ezra
- Shiblon: Alma 11; "Shiblon, my Book of Mormon Hero"; "Being like Shiblon"
- Amnor: Alma 11; Amnor [money]; Amnor [spy]
- Antion: Alma 11; or Antionum, Land of
God dammit, these names for money are all recycled names of people. Never once outside of Alma 11 are these convoluted currencies ever used. With all the iterations of the Pride Cycle™️, we could have quantified how many multiplicities of a measure of barley the people had amassed! We could have valuated what those pesky Gadianton Robbers were selling secrets for.
Fullness of the Gospel¶
The Book of Mormon is a volume of holy scripture comparable to the Bible. It is a record of God’s dealings with ancient inhabitants of the Americas and contains the fulness of the everlasting gospel.
— Introduction Page to the Book of Mormon
The Lord Himself has stated that the Book of Mormon contains the “fulness of the gospel of Jesus Christ” (D&C 20:9). That does not mean it contains every teaching, every doctrine ever revealed. Rather, it means that in the Book of Mormon we will find the fulness of those doctrines required for our salvation. And they are taught plainly and simply so that even children can learn the ways of salvation and exaltation. The Book of Mormon offers so much that broadens our understandings of the doctrines of salvation.
— Chapter 9: The Book of Mormon—Keystone of Our Religion, Teachings of Presidents of the Church: Ezra Taft Benson
"I mean, yeah, we said it contains the fullness of the gospel, but that doesn't mean that it actually contains the fullness of the gospel! It just contains what you need for salvation."
... What? It absolutely does not.
If someone were to have access only to this book and tried to create a church from its teachings, it would look nothing like the Brighamite sect of the LDS movement. There would be no temple ceremony, no Word-of-Wisdom, no Tithing, no Garments, no delineation of priesthood, signs or tokens, no hierarchy of upper leadership, no organization of wards, branches, or stakes, no outlining of how the next prophet is chosen...
If we were to outline all of the things that the modern LDS church teaches that we must do, count how many can be clearly and specifically cited back to the Book of Mormon. How far would you get? Using the standard of the Temple Recommend Interview questions, or even the Baptismal Interview questions that missionaries use, would anyone who reads the Book of Mormon without any outside context conclude that those things are necessary for salvation? Evidently, that's what the "fullness of the gospel" means.