A Comparison of the LDS Articles of Faith with the Bible - Part 4 by Lloyd Sharp

Article 8: "We believe the Bible to be the word of God as far as it is translated correctly; we also believe the Book of Mormon to be the word of God."

Let us begin by dealing with the first sentence of this Article. It is true that only an accurate translation of the ancient Biblical manuscripts can truly represent the word of God in another language. However, there is no such thing as a perfect translation. Considering the different methods of translation and the countless differences between hundreds of languages, even the LDS church will not claim to have a perfect translation of the Book of Mormon from English to another language.

Joseph Smith did claim "that the Book of Mormon was the most correct of any book on earth." (Introduction to the Book of Mormon) This is an amazing claim when we consider that the language Joseph Smith allegedly translated, known as reformed Egyptian (Mormon 9:32, Book of Mormon), does not exist. There is NO evidence that such a language ever existed. There have also been almost 4,000 changes made in the current Book of Mormon, yet Joseph Smith said the original was the most correct. Also worth noting is that if such a language did exist, the only known copy of this language has vanished. Thus we must trust in the word of Joseph Smith alone for the accuracy of this translation.

Since the original gold plates the book was allegedly written on are nowhere to be found, all copies of the Book of Mormon written in foreign languages are translated from the current English version. Thus all translations of the Book of Mormon other than the English translation are literally a translation of a translation. If these golden plates ever really existed (and we contend they did not), a great deal is undoubtedly lost in these second hand translations.

In contrast, the Bible is translated from copies of the original manuscript. These manuscripts are available for study now and the languages they are written in can be studied for the most accurate translation possible.

The Eighth Article is not limited to translation alone, and therefore misrepresents the LDS view of the Bible. Mormonism teaches that the Bible is missing many "plain and precious things." (1 Nephi 13:38, Book of Mormon) "Many insertions were made [to the Biblical manuscripts], some of them 'slanted' for selfish purposes, while at times deliberate falsification and fabrications were perpetrated." (LDS Apostle Mark E. Petersen, As Translated Correctly, p. 4, insert added) According to one BYU professor, the New Testament was corrupted "by the end of the first century, and continued in the second and third centuries A.D. [to be corrupted]" (Robert J. Matthews, What the Book of Mormon Tells Us About the Bible, BYU, 26th October 1991, insert added)

This argument questions the transmission not the translation of the texts. "Transmission refers to how the [Biblical] manuscripts were copied and handed down through the centuries." (Bill McKeever & Eric Johnson, Mormonism 101, p. 101, insert added)

Since we do not have the original writings of the various books of the Bible, we must rely on the accuracy of the copies. Christian scholars Norman Geisler and William Nix explain that "the New Testament text is preserved in some 5, 366 partial and complete manuscript portions that were copied by hand from the second through the fifteenth centuries.... if there were no biblical manuscripts available today, the entire New Testament could be reconstructed from the writings of the church Fathers of the first three centuries with the exception of eleven verses." (Geisler & Nix, A General Introduction to the Bible, pp. 409, 466)

While there are minor differences (also known as variants) between the thousands of texts, none affect essential Christian doctrine. This is best seen when we look at the evidence supporting the reliability of the Old Testament. When the Dead Sea Scrolls were discovered in 1947, scholars learned that they dated back to and before the time of Christ. One scroll held the entire book of Isaiah. This scroll is 99% the same as the next closest copy, which is 1,000 years older and dates to about 900 A.D. (Ron Rhodes, Reasoning From the Scriptures With the Mormons, pp. 170-171)

When we compare this evidence to evidence of other ancient writings we see how amazing the preservation of the Bible is. Homer's Iliad has the next highest number of manuscript copies compared to the New Testament with 643 copies. Caesar's Gallic Wars has a mere ten copies, with a thousand year gap between the time it was written and the earliest copies were found. The Book of Mormon has absolutely zero copies before Joseph Smith allegedly translated it. There is also a 2,400-year gap between the time the first book was allegedly written in the Book of Mormon to the time it was allegedly translated by Joseph Smith.

In contrast the Bible has literally thousands of ancient manuscripts from which to work with. In the case of the New Testament we have copies within 100 years of when they were written. When all the evidence is considered we see that the Biblical manuscripts are more accurate and more abundant than any other ancient text on Earth.

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