The Lucy Code

greetings from Penang Malaysia my name is Dean Paul Travis I recently had an opportunity to be the concluding speaker at the final live ex-mormon Foundation conference in Salt Lake City I'd like to thank Richard Pak and Kathleen Jones and Sue Emmett for giving me the opportunity to share the microphone with well Bagley Simon Sotherton and Kathleen Kimball Mellon aqus now despite tremendous technical efforts on the part of stevecori my presentation was sadly cut short I'm honored by the overwhelming response that I've received what was presented and in the following video I'm pleased to share with you that full presentation I hope you enjoy it as much as I enjoyed preparing it for you about 600 years before the birth of Christ a Greek slave was credited as the author of many tales and one of these Aesop's fables the wind of the Sun were arguing over who was greater they saw a traveler coming down the road of the sunset I see a way to decide her dispute which ever us can cause that traveler to take up his cloak shall be regarded this the stronger you begin the Sun hid behind a cloud and the wind began to blow as hard as he could the harder he blew the more the traveler wrapped his cloak around him finally the wind gave up the Sun popped out and shone his glory down on the traveller soon found it too hot to continue with his cloak on and so he took it off the purported moral of this fable is the kindness impacts us more than severity and the gentleness and calm persuasion wind where force and bluster fail the point of the story can be understood without belief the events described actually happened the real world does not contain animated Suns talking frogs and conceited City mice it is also quite possible that this particular slave did not even tell this particular story part of the enjoyment of these volumes is the implicit understanding that they can contain universal truths even if they are the tales of their history and authorship are not literally true no one has a strong vested interest in these stories religious convictions are not connected to them families do not fight over them Aesop's fables are simply seen as quaint tales that may do somebody somewhere some good long before I became a technology innovator I turned 11 and became a Mormon the missionaries who lived in our house made sure I was fed the then standard narrative he's true earnest young man once all the other taller taught me the lessons well I was permitted to make the adult decision to become a Mormon shortly after I walked from the apartment behind our house and found the elder to baptize me laying on a bed girl of my ward several months before her 13th birthday as I stood there shocked that was brutally assured out by his companion who held me upside down twisting my leg until I cried he threatened more physical violence if I told anyone what I'd seen he eventually this illicit relationship came to the attention of my mother and from her to the mission president who took control he swore all the families involved to secrecy the elders were not released and sent home the members of the congregation were not told the police were not called the companionship was split up and each was transferred the whole thing was swept under the rug what was plain to me then and now was that a truth that could negatively impact the faith of others was something that should not be talked about openly a few years later I came to seminary surprised to find people crying and happy I asked why between Joyce offs they shared the Spencer W Kimball our prophet had just received a new revelation allowing all worthy male members to be ordained I was puzzled until one of them said that blacks could not hold the priesthood I was shocked our family moved a lot and we had been among the few white kids in the public schools in Oakland California we knew firsthand the stings of racism and ostracism what am i guiding lights was a burning conviction to specifically not be racist I was surprised to learn for the first time that anyone had ever not been able to hold the priesthood because of their skin color my worried bishop quickly reassured me there were good reasons for the ban and gave me a copy of a book called Mormonism in the Negro he testified of the claims of the book and that the band was doctrinal required and from God by then much of my identity came from being a Mormon the church offered community family and stability it seemed a moot point going forward according to my bishop we Mormons weren't racist and never had been when it came time to serve my mission I passed I still had no respect for the missionaries instead I graduated early from high school married the Bishop's daughter and started my own technology company we fell into the routine of being Chapel Mormons and said about making and raising good Mormon children of our own as a technology innovator I wrote and worked with hundreds of thousands of lines of source code I developed and patented things no one had ever seen before a large part of my time was spent debugging finding little things here and there that weren't quite right that could impact the big picture years later despite making polygamy while being the emcee for Pioneer Day I found myself serving in a leadership role in the church that's a member of a stake presidency in California soon after proposition 8 was introduced the goal makes same-sex marriage unconstitutional I wasn't fully on board with church leaders who warned a Satan wanted to destroy traditional families using gay marriage but I remained silent and supported my leaders one morning I was out canvassing my neighborhood for support a door opened I could see children playing inside the sun shining down on them the pleasant woman who answered smiled patiently I asked if I could place a sign in the yard she told me she didn't support prop 8 and that her wife didn't either the irony hit me in the face I had become the persecutor the bully seeking to ostracize Ferg I thought that was no better than the angry mob so it wants to attack Mormons I was overcome with a strong feeling that out of all religions are should not be the one to call non-traditional marriage counterfeit I found a dumpster nearby and threw away my remaining signs when the law passed my oldest son called me upset he was no longer an active member and had gone against church teachings by marrying a wonderful woman from a different race he demanded I justify and explained myself I tried but couldn't defend the Church's position because it was no longer mine as a church we had not been honest with our fellow citizens our leaders publicly claimed we'd not been involved in prop 8 I had personally participated in many meetings where we were it wasn't a closely guarded secret that the amount of money donated would be considered when extending future leadership callings when these amounts were revealed publicly everyone knew I'd give him nothing I was released and replaced with someone who had shortly after I moved to Southern California and avoided leadership callings I tried to go back to being just a chapel Mormon in October 2013 dieter Dorf made a startling announcement during conference buried in his doubt your doubts talk was an admission past leaders have made mistakes that could cause doubts about our religion and it's truth claims I couldn't recall a leader ever speaking like this I wondered what we ever know which leaders which mistakes two months later the church released an essay called race in the priesthood as I read it I felt betrayed in the essay the church claims the priesthood ban was just the product of racist men and racist times during races things it specifically disavowed and condemned all racism past and present in any form mentioning directly the teachings from the book my bishop had given me the church was condemning and disavowing not only prior prophets doctrine scripture and teachings they were condemning and disavowing me for being racist the one thing I had been assured we never were as I was reeling from the implications of this essay additional essays were quietly published each one felt like a blow to my very core containing starting revelations about troubling aspects of church history and doctrine I'd never been told about after the fourteenth essay I decided my faith needed a serious reboot if the church itself was now rejecting key portions of things that once taught is fundamental eternal and unchanging I felt it important that no religious belief of mine be placed beyond scrutiny and examination I had a lot of questions and I wondered if others to to online I found others like me Jeremy Runnells of faith will return missionary was ready to resign over his questions his grandfather begged him to write them down promising a family friend the CES director would respond the result was Jeremy's in from the CES letter instead of official answers unofficial apologists attacked and demonized Jeremy they actually tried to debunk his questions to me silencing someone for asking questions seem more like North Korea than Jesus Christ Jeremy resigned his church membership minutes before and improperly officiated kangaroo court could kick him out part of my spiritual reboot involves studying the world's religions there were three core traits of humanity in every civilization and every time the first was to have doubts and questions the second was to have spiritual experiences and the third which would look for patterns to reconcile the two to tell people that they shouldn't have doubts or that they should doubt them well that's to rob from them a core trait of humanity more importantly Jeremy's questions were pretty good they begged for an explanation when word got out that the church would now withhold temple priests to their membership blessings from gay people and from their children leaders assured us we really weren't homophobic the arguments that apologetics all seemed very familiar I prayed about what specifically I was required to believe what was the bare minimum I had to accept just literally true I didn't want another 30 years to go by only to find out these policies were just homophobic leaders in homophobic times making homophobic and on christ-like mistakes that would eventually be disavowed and condemned as I was struggling to understand what I was required to believe I found a talk Jeffrey Holland game in 2006 he claimed members didn't have to have a burning conviction as to the origins of Mormonism we'll be committed to any foundational statement or premise of Mormonism well if I didn't take some things literally or anything literally I wasn't going to be kicked out this resulted at one of those light bulb moments that we all have Elder Holland was admitting that something didn't have to be literally true to contain truth as I said it appears one Sunday I looked around and realized I had become a figurative Mormon I didn't literally believe many of the claims and then I discovered other figurative Mormons they were everywhere they're your teachers your presidents your leaders your missionaries moms sons friends and family so I realized they were everywhere I thought well maybe they've always been here maybe among the founding Mormons there were figurative Mormons but then I remember that lesson I'd learned well all those years ago a truth that could negatively impact the faith of others was something that should not be talked about openly but Jeremy replaced right at the top of his CS letter a quote from J Reuben Clark that if we have the truth that can't be harmed by investigation and if we had not the truth it ought to be harmed he didn't say true he said truth maybe many of the things we've been told were literally true didn't need to be they could still have a truth inside then I came across the Holland challenge Elder Holland stated in 2009 that the only way to avoid crawling over under or around the Book of Mormon was to make an honest attempt to count for its origin it was a more refined way of asking how an illiterate farm boy could create 531 pages of heretofore unknown text he being with literary and Semitic complexity well Jeremy had certainly done a great job of asking questions but he'd never been given any answers how many people including me had had spiritual experiences but the only explanation offered was the official supernatural narrative in this challenge elder Holland's words spoke to me I didn't have to go over under or around I could go right through I just had to make an honest attempt to explain it I could take all the competing truth clips from believers and former believers and treat them my source code I complete by spiritual reboot by debugging the Book of Mormon and Mormonism itself and so challenge accepted so traveled here to a luxury beachfront condo in Penang Malaysia and with the sounds of the daily Muslim prayers in the background I accessed high-speed Internet and researched thousands and thousands of books from ancient books to modern books to old books to new books and what I did was put together not something that I can tell you is definitely how it happened that be foolish to make that claim all I'm saying is that this is a probable explanation this is how it could have happened and if you don't believe my stories are true that's ok after all as a figurative Mormon I believe that you can find truth in things that are not literally true I started where most historians from Bushman de Brodie began Lucy Mac Smith she was more than just a nursing mother she was the only author that was present from the bright first chapters of early Mormonism to the dark closing pages in Nauvoo within days of crying out to God over the corpses of her martyred children she engaged young Martha Corey to act to suscribe they sat for hours as Lucy stared down into the stone cold past less than one year after they began 70 year old Lucy despite her lack of a formal education obtained a copy right for her 300 pages of heretofore unknown text teeming with literary and Semitic complexity yet she never published it despite claiming it was for the benefit of All Saints her book was of critical importance to the few men carefully circling each other for control over the headless church mother Smith's memoir could make or break a future prophet priest or King where other historians quickly accepted her narrative and moved past I stopped and dug deeper I found serious issues that have been overlooked by everyone the first was a ridiculous story of her husband losing money selling crystallized ginseng to China well the timing for the deal was off by months not allowing for the travel time by ships of the day plus the alleged payment in a chest of gold that was not something that Chinese did and the Chinese valued that she of a whole route in the shape of a human body why bring up a story where her husband dug up human shape truths and chopped them up well then I discovered that her long death scenes at relatives dying from the symptoms of poisoning drinking rice water the source of arsenic through clenched teeth and there were these long-winded death monologues that included words from old religious texts one relative quoting st. John of the Cross and another being liken to the Puritan protester and hutchinson who was killed by Indians then mother Lucy made many many indirect references to specific locations and names when she clearly remembered enough to explicitly state them was she hiding something and that's when it hit me this wasn't a book it was a ransom note if you understood the full context of Lucy's narrative why you could use it to quickly unravel the truth claims of every branch of Mormonism Lucy's family had paid dearly in blood for the new religion if she didn't receive some benefit she'd ruin everything for everyone Brigham Young knew exactly what had to happen Lucy and Emma got the money and resources in Nauvoo they needed to survive in return for their silence everyone including Brigham got to keep their branch of Mormonism but the world well the world did not get the truth shortly after the deal was struck the Prophet James Strang took the Saints that followed him north to become the pirate king of Beaver Island where he performed many Joseph like miracles Sidney Rigdon took the few saints that followed him back east Brigham Young the Lion of the Lord modern-day Moses he took his Sansa to Salt Lake City among the Martha Corey he ordered what he thought was the only copy of Lucy's manuscript thrown into the memory hole of his archives where he assumed it would be forgotten forever Lucy and Emma and their family remained in Nauvoo in 1852 the church finally decided it was time to be more open and honest Salt Lake leaders announced they had lied for years polygamy long denied and cast as a scandalous lie by unscrupulous anti annexed Mormons the very issue that had resulted in the deaths of Joseph and Hyrum was true doctrinal and from God another bombshell that changed the then standard narrative Joseph had also been a polygamist a series of essays by Orson Pratt was rushed into print explaining things in lawyerly doublespeak many felt betrayed conference and entire congregations resigned missionary efforts particularly in England took a beating Orson was called upon to again work his magic like the time he had introduced the first vision narrative years after the church had formed on his way east Orson came across another copy of Lucy's book and obtained her permission to use it as he saw fit in England he heavily edited the work removing many of her stories adding things she hadn't included he took the focus off her entire family to shine a spotlight only on Joseph making it seem he had approved of the work without Brigham Young's knowledge of permission Orson published the hybrid book in England and used it to resurrect the flagging missionary efforts when Britain found out he was outraged and announced the book as a tissue of lies a public spat between Brigham and Orson resulted in rising sales of the book in Salt Lake when Lucy died Emma used her resources to help her son Joseph Smith the third claimed leadership of the scattered remnants of the Midwestern saints the young prophet believes strongly two core tenets his mother had drilled into him since childhood the first his father was a good man the second who had never practiced polygamy young Joseph announced he was coming after Brigham to reclaim the lost scenes in Utah in response Brigham pol the Fahrenheit 451 and demanded Orson's version of Lucy's book be banned and all copies rounded up and destroyed why did Brigham Young see Lucy's book as a Pandora's box that he tried to close his concern should not have been dismissed these stories certainly should have never been reprinted in a children's book as I came to fully understand the context of the threat Brigham saw I discovered hidden threads and buried treasures in Lucy's writing as each mystery unraveled I was reminded of the words Lucy spoke in General Conference in 1845 are you willing to receive stolen goods or not I want to know if you believe in such things for the rest of my presentation I have a lot of stories in limited time I'll go quick but if you miss anything or want more details be sure to get my book it's important to note that this is not the Spalding Rip doodle theory that theory is so many moving parts it never really explains why Rigden would need Joseph at all when he'd already written fake scriptures on his own there are a few names that we do need to know you can research them yourselves and when you do I'm pretty sure you'll have a greater understanding of how I can make the bold claim that the Lucy code plays out the most plausible natural explanation for the way it went down what she pointed to destroys the truth claims of every branch of more nezam our first stop is the real ancient America like all other ancient Americans the Aztecs never had horses elephants cows goats sheep pigs barley wheat bees chariots wheel scimitar Tsar steel but they did have cities 200,000 strong larger than most in Europe they had technology religion government modes of transportation in their own form of currency they also had sharp and lethal weapons made from volcanic obsidian glass when Cortez showed up initially the Aztecs had superior manpower and they were every bit the equal of the Spaniards the Spanish were driven off after they brutally slaughtered members of the royal family they showed up a year later expecting a fight on their hands not sure they would prevail what they found instead was a ghost town in the end it was Spanish germs not Spanish steel that defeated the Aztecs in addition to their cities and gold being looted their religious artifacts including religious mirrors that had allowed their priests to see the future in the heavens were taken the old world feasted on the stolen treasures of the new 50 years later Queen Elizabeth ruled England with the greatest scientist and magician in the world at her side John Dee used astrology to choose the Queen's coronation day when a new star appeared in the heavens people were scared they thought the world was ending and Jesus was returning as owner of the largest library and earth Dee sought answers to this heavenly sign but the later destruction of the Spanish Armada Dee told the Queen that all of this was the message from God and that she was to be the next King Arthur with Dee her Merlin Dee had consulted a history text called the Scott a chronic on a multi-volume work written in Latin containing an earlier abridged history and the earliest references to our theory and legends dee informed the Queen that this time Camelot would be a British Empire spanning the globe he created special instruments and charts from the Queen selected Francis Drake to make these prophecies reality d next turned his sights on discovering the science behind God's hierarchy of angels everyone knew that the entire world was run by different levels of angels so that hidden mysteries would be revealed if you could talk with them he was confident that his stone Aztec Mayor was the key to heavenly communication ancient civilizations of the Hebrews Greeks Romans Egyptians and Aztecs contained lost knowledge that could help D but all their priests and magicians were long dead he again consulted the Scott a chronicon for advice on how to proceed there he read The Legend of skoda and Egyptian princess and a Greek prince who had joined forces wandered in the desert for a bit and then built ships and sail West their descendants eventually became the first kings and queens of Ireland and Scotland who kept their son worshiping religion magic stones were central to these beliefs they had even brought the Stone of Scone with them the very stone pillow of the Prophet Jacob it used when he'd received his famous vision Jacob's Ladder was the stairway to and from heaven that allowed God and angels to communicate with men dnews Scottish druids used magic egg stones as seer stones to find lost treasures and see into heavenly realms if he couldn't find an actual Aztec or Egyptian magician to help him maybe he could find the next best thing someone descended from Irish or Scottish royalty who carried with in their veins the blood and power of the Lost Egyptians Edward Kelly showed up with a forged genealogy claiming he was just the man Dee was looking for as a convicted thief Kelly's ears have been cut off but this didn't stop Dee from giving him a trial run he was delighted discovered that Edward could see into the stone never the scientist he documented their many sessions and would claim that angels from the city of Enoch were communicating with him these angels taught them the Enochian alphabet so Kelly could read the parchment cartoon bubbles that showed up whenever they spoke they learned the ancient atomic language and we're excited when the Signet of Solomon was revealed he contained magic symbols of a compass square horizontal mark and naval line these would eventually find their way into Freemasonry and Mormonism if you've ever wondered about the real origins of your garments now you know they came from Enochian angels communicating through cartoon bubbles in a stolen Aztec mirror to a convicted thief who used to fabricate a genealogy to trick the Queen's magician into believing he was descended from Scottish royalty and being Egyptian by blood could work with magic stones the Signet also contained letters at the corners that when read properly said pay laying hail Edward Kelly despite being named by Dee as a prophet and seer eventually grew bored and wanted to trick European Royals into believing he knew how to turn led into gold to hasten the end of their work Kelly revealed the final secret of the Enochian angels the two men would have all things in common including wives they convinced their spouses to go along with this but Wendy is much younger wife got pregnant the partnership ended Dee returned to England I found his library and reputation destroyed Kelly died from injuries sustained trying to escape a royal prison he'd been thrown into John Dee's many deeds were written out of the history books and other scientists learned well that when looking for ancient mysteries it was best to keep secret anything couldn't proof John DS unwritten warning over 250 years before Mormonism was if you ever ran into a man who claimed to be a prophet and seer who could talk to the heavens by looking into a seer stone well you'd better keep a close eye on your wife starting in the Middle Ages stonemason guild sought to protect their wages by carefully controlling the workforce master and apprentice masons could travel to any castle or other projects and proved their membership in the guild through a series of four special land shakes many felt Scottish and Irish maces were particularly skilled because of their claim to Egyptian lineage and that civilizations well-known stone projects including the pyramids in 1560 exiled from the murderous reign of the Protestant persecuting Queen Bloody Mary published the first mass-produced an easily readable English Bible the Geneva Bible dedicated to newly crowned Queen Elizabeth was extremely popular with over 150 editions it was the primary Bible of Protestant reformers and the Bible used by Shakespeare Milton Knox and Bunyan in 1611 King James shocked the world by producing his own Bible it showed God willing over heaven of three degrees of the Sun Moon and stars the controversial first edition included illustrations showing the union of Adam and Eve being solemnized by one of the secret stonemason handshakes parts of the text for starkly different when Adam and Eve discovered their nakedness in the new Bible they didn't cover themselves with pants as in all prior Bibles they covered themselves with Masonic aprons further illustrations showed additional genealogies listed in the Bible being formed by that same Masonic handshake the different tribes of Israel were charted and connected a royal crest showing how God favored the kings and queens of England even the King of Kings Jesus Christ was the product of a Masonic union between Joseph and Mary not only was this blasphemous Bible rejected by the people the monarchy was as well in his youth Oliver Cromwell had been a live and let live Christian who followed the Dutch theologian Jacob as harmonious he became a politician and then a failed farmer and suffered a nervous breakdown he converted to stringent Puritanism ignoring the Divine Right of Kings he signed the execution order for the regicide of King Charles he gained a reputation as a brutal theocratic dictator and earned the nickname God's executioner when he tried to pass on his title as Lord Protector to his unpopular son motions were put in place to invite a monarchy back into the Kingdom shortly after this two events radically changed the world London suffered the last major epidemic of the bubonic plague killing over 100,000 people the following year saw the great fire that destroyed most of the city the call went out far and wide for Masons as Portland stone was the material chosen to rebuild London properly when the Masons came they brought with them their secret societies at first meeting in taverns they expanded to dedicated lodges it's non-operative Mason's joined their ranks when most of the rebuilding was done and the workers left for their next job many of the larger lodges remained with artists scientists and Nobles filling their ranks scientists in particular like Isaac Newton used the secret societies to conduct controversial experiments searching for things like the Philosopher's Stone that could turn base metal into gold and the famed elixir that could bring eternal life they still weren't sure where the old world of magic ended and the emerging world of science began but they didn't want their reputations to be destroyed as John Dee's had been Newton's involvement in these controversial experiments remained a secret for hundreds of years over time Freemasonry evolved and expanded to include three and only three core degrees that are still used today entered apprenticed fellow craft at master Mason Lodge meetings were an interactive ritual that included drama props and costumes that allowed neophytes to work their way up the ranks the lodges created competing false histories trying to stretch the origins back as far as they could first to early England then to the time of Christ then the flood and then Adam and finally before the earth itself had been created the demand for new experiences and additional knowledge resulted in numerous appendant rights like the merit badges in Scouting each of these borrowed segments and narratives from the core degrees with many religious traditions having a specific appendant write allegory symbols in history common to all launches include the building and destruction of the Temple of Solomon with each Masonic Lodge standing as proxy for the ancient edifice Jacob's Ladder was an important conduit whereby God known to Masons as the grand architect of the universe What's in heavenly messengers to earth four times a year during the solstices and equinoxes the Tree of Life was based on three core pillars and was a way to level up his members work together on the prime goal of masonry that making good men better some of the many appendant rights included ones like royal ark masonry with the catchphrase holiness to the Lord Masons would learn they would like worker bees and about the importance of gathering knowledge Masonic words like Keystone cornerstone and arch were sprinkled heavily into the rites as for the ironic and Melchizedek Priesthood in the use of veils handshakes and secret knocks those given the erotic priests did learn about the rod of Aaron and the terms power of the rod rods men and the power of Aaron were used synonymously and what a pendant ride called the elected the nine Mason's would role play being one of Solomon's guards searching for an assassin they would find him in a cave drunk and asleep laying next to his own sword which they would use to behead him at this point you may be wondering what does all this have to do with Mormonism I promise you we're almost done and when we are you'll see how it all fits together remember I found each and every one of these stories by following Clues in Lucy's book we're down just a few years before Lucy Mack and Joseph Smith senior are married and we find ourselves in Scotland young Robert Burns is being forced to leave for Jamaica where he faces a sad life as a slave Wrangler on the last night presiding over his Masonic Lodge he shares a poem he wrote bidding farewell to his brethren at the st. James Lodge at Tarleton every mason is thrilled the discovered that they can buy an entire book of his poetry that includes other secret Masonic poems this book can be kept out for everyone to enjoy with only masons knowing the hidden references Robert sells out of the first printing earns enough money to marry and not only avoid see humility is waiting in Jamaica he becomes Scotland's greatest poet Freemasonry has now been around for several hundred years and most no longer believe in the literal truth claims made early on they've discovered the real alchemy of making good men better and Burns is a shining example of this the rise of Freemasonry is also guaranteed the widespread adoption of the King James Bible you have the free masons of Scotland to thank every new year's when you sing birds auld lang syne as for Robert his farewell poem is recited in lodges all over the world and eventually morphs into the most shortened Masonic parting brethren on gyah across the pond lives a very special Indian born in a Mohegan mud hut Samson akhom eventually converts to Scottish Presbyterianism and enters the tiny school of the great minister Eleazar wheel Eleazar has made it his life's work to create missionaries and ministers to the Indians and thrills at the chance to teach Indians to do this themselves like all of eliezer students samson has given a classical education and learns Greek Hebrew and Latin he learns rhetoric and scriptures and how to act like a gentleman inspired by eleazar's plan to educate more Indians that now Reverend Samson Occam answers the call to serve a two-year fundraising mission to England he preaches over 300 sermons there to everyone including royalty he is asked to stay in England but declines feeling himself to be more at home in Scotland he crosses Hadrian's Wall the physical barrier between the land in the north and the south and is dismayed at the state of the Scottish church were even the sermon he'd first heard from Eliezer about the sort of justice appears to fall on deaf ears he returns with honor having raised millions in today's money a special fund has been set up by the Scottish Society for the propagation of Christian knowledge they're keenly interested in methods for Christianizing heathens as they still have murderous erotic Highlanders causing them problems Samson and Eliezer have a falling out when a remote site of New Hampshire selected for the college a few Indians near there are traditional enemies of Samson's tribal Samson goes on to give and published a famous execution servant and creates his own tribe of Christian Indians in Oneida a town about 30 miles west of Utica New York he never reconciles with Eliezer and dies peacefully among his people the Brotherton Indians Sam never sets foot on the campus he funded his writings become the country's first Indian authored bestseller his sermons often include his belief that the Lord shows him a weak thing of the world and an Indian to bring about much righteousness buildings ponds and paths are named after him and everyone on the campus he funded learns of his legend many including famous people thought his name was Samuel the Indian Eliezer names his remote College after his main benefactor the Earl of Dartmouth another contributor has the charity prep school named after him both schools exist in the same location they share the exact same buildings teachers and purpose to turn young men into ministers and missionaries to the Indians and to prepare them to become Freemasons when Eliezer dies his son John becomes the president of the college the limited faculty includes the beloved Bezalel Woodward the math and philosophy professor and the very popular and former student professor John Smith professor Gianni is adored by the students and takes on several crucial jobs including professor of learn languages the college librarian the minister of the college church and the owner of the local bookstore professor Gianni is the cousin of both Lucy back Smith's mother Lydia and Joseph Smith seniors father a sale he is also the teacher who inspired former students including Solomon Spalding Ethan Smith and Daniel Webster he is an expert lexicographer and master of ancient languages who not only reads writes and speaks Greek Latin Hebrew and other languages he's a published author who has written the grammars for many of them he is also a natural philosopher and loves to debate and reason with his students if you were lucky enough to be a student of early Dartmouth during the decades the professor Johnny's teachings or the core curriculum you would attend his Church of Christ and learn about the pre-existence about a pre or thought ohmic covenant where the plan of salvation was revealed to the father sons and the sons of men and that Christ church exists in all ages of the earth you would attend his school of the prophets where you would learn Hebrew Greek Latin you would learn that spirit is a simpler form of matter and about the importance of free agency and the prosperity cycle you would learn that there are people living on other worlds and that light brought light in the light of reason are the things that guide us you might attend his Masonic Arminian sermons where you would learn that priesthood is the source of Christ's Authority you would learn about the ironic priesthood and the Melchizedek Priesthood and how they are Co eternal with God you would learn about degrees of glory in the eternities at about a spiritual death after the fall you would learn that the father argues for justice and the son argues for mercy as a new student you would be encouraged to follow in the footsteps of Daniel Webster and join one of the two debating societies your dues would help fund the massive libraries used to prepare your team for the great end of your debate between the socials and the freighters you would be taught correct principles and be expected to govern yourself wisely and to learn wisdom in your youth the two debating society libraries place Dartmouth in a position that far exceeded other premier religious schools of the day the campus housed multiple poorly guarded collections of rare and valuable books on religion philosophy ancient languages masonry and more over 10,000 catalog titles were readily available plus each professor had a personal library and the small town had a well-stocked bookstore in 1797 President Wheelock allowed dr. Nathan Smith to joined the faculty through a profit sharing arrangement turned Dartmouth into the fourth Medical School in the United States dr. Nathan joined professor Johnny and the rest of the small faculty and is remembered today mostly for his great deeds but he was also infamous at the time for other deeds that were buried and require a little digging dr. Nathan Smith was living the early American dream he had gone from poor farmer to doctor to educator graduating from the third Medical School in the u.s. at Harvard and creating the fourth at Dartmouth he went on to create other medical schools but he kept being run out of town by angry mobs his medical schools had a dark secret Nathan's dilemma was that the growing country demanded good doctors good doctors must know Anatomy and learning Anatomy required dissecting bodies bodies came from graves but the public also demanded the sanctity of graves more schools however meant greater demand for doctors dissections and bodies there were several bad places for Nathan to get bodies he left behind letters to other doctors asking them to procure bodies for him there was also the time he hired the famous anatomist dr. Alexander Ramsey the hunchback Scottish dwarf but that lasted less than a year there were students that he involved one name is Twitchell did a great job but in 1809 another student did a lousy job and left behind his wallet at the scene of the crime this led authorities straight back to Dartmouth and the result was an angry mob demand the school be shut down there were several good places to get bodies the few criminals executed each year were fair game and Nathan even wrote the governor asking him to delay an execution for months until his anatomy class was in session with no federal law enforcement a body procured across the river in Vermont was safe if it could be brought on campus likewise bodies from New Hampshire were traded to the Medical School in neighboring vermont the most effective means however was the professionals known as the resurrectionists these small teams had perfected their techniques could train new recruits and were a reliable source as demand and risks increased with the growth of medical colleges so did the Wraiths but public outcry could be kept to a minimum if you use professionals in the highly religious era of his time Nathan Smith learned a truth by digging up a loved ones corpse for anatomy students to dissect could negatively impact the faith and happiness of others but it was still something that needed to be done so it should be it's just not something that you should talk about openly here is a fictional help-wanted ad that shows exactly the type of professional the Nathan was looking for do you need money are you willing to bend the rules can you keep a secret we need a spotter to quietly write around locating fresh graves we need able-bodied quiet diggers at night you need to have a good cover story like failed money digger etc we could pay you cash or kids tuition and housing on Mason or an iminium preferred no Puritans Hyrum Smith was born of goodly parents who recognized his intelligence for the first 16 years of his life he enjoyed the original Masonic spelling of his name H I are a camel when his family was given the opportunity to send only one of their children to an exclusive boarding school Hiram was chosen over all his brothers including his older brother Alvin in 1811 eleven-year-old Hyrum Smith goes off to the same boarding school that his cousin Stephen had started a year earlier they live on campus at Dartmouth their Hyrum studies to become a missionary to the Indians and a minister he learns Greek Latin and Hebrew at a school of the prophets he is indoctrinated with his relative John Smith's religious philosophies attending thousands of sermons and prayers and lectures he prepares to become a Mason and to receive the Masonic priesthood he can attend the medical lectures of dr. Nathan Smith and he can watch debates among the socials of the freighters as they reasoned together he has access to numerous religious libraries at school Hiram lives by a river in a great and spacious building the manner of dress for his young rich classmates and old teachers is exceedingly fine when compared with his plain clothes his grandfather Solomon writes a religious book talking about a conversion experience where heavenly lights visited his room late at night his uncle Jason is a charismatic cult leader his family gives health care from Nathan Smith his father brother and cousins are well digger's and a remote isolated town that doesn't need wells his family and Stephens family move in together in a house owned by a Dartmouth trustee it is this time period that Lucy recalls in her book with the famous story of Joseph boyhood surgery she remembers precise details and measurements about the surgery decades later but somehow forgets that dr. Nathan's last name is her own Smith and she refers to him instead as dr. stone she claims that Joseph refuses to be bound or to take alcohol but a loving parent would have required those things at that time she claims that she sends Joseph to Uncle Jesse and Salem to recover in 1813 but she's been feuding with Jesse since 1799 and salem at that time why it's still the battlefront for the war of 1812 she mentions that Hyrum goes to an Academy everything about her story implicates Dartmouth but she won't mention it or the infamous grave-digging doctors Nathan by name in high rooms 14th year there's great interest in the subject of religion on campus the Dartmouth Church of Masonic Armenians is in a battle with the town of Hanover Santa Mason Calvinists congregate which is true there's an unprecedented outpouring of spirit among all the students a young Levi Spalding a relative of Solomon feels unworthy he retires to a secret Grove to pray Levi wonders which church to join and he's visited by a flash of brilliant light and feels that his sins are forgiven Levi shares this experience widely right away and only ever tells one version he leaves for a lifelong mission to the Indians but not the Native Americans the actual Indians in India many students are inspired by young Levi and they join the spiritual revival that spreads throughout the campus by 1816 it's clear that dr. Nathan Smith must go he's perjured himself at a grave robbing trial his attempts to calm the town have actually converted more to strict Calvinism these Calvinist trustees become the majority and take over the Dartmouth leadership the Armenian theology and John Smith's teachings are buried the ban on recruiting Mason's on campus is enforced and Nathan's own daughter dies at 15 years of age he flees town after his last lectures the students revolted attempts to seize their unguarded massive libraries and on the other side of the world there's a catastrophe as Mount Tambora blows up old Dartmouth is dead at the same time the Smith family is warned out of Norwich they're kicked out of the Dartmouth trustees house along with the Mack family Hiram is ganked from school one year before he graduates and Stephen who has just graduated goes with them for 20 years they've only moved back and forth 5 to 20 miles in a tight little circle and all was near family at this time Joseph's senior leaves with massive debts and goes 300 miles away the older boys follow and then Lucie she cheats the driver at Owen Ida of just west of Utica and in her manuscript just forgets to mention that this is the name of the famous town of Ockham's Brotherhood Indians the family reunites in palmyra with only a small portion of their effects and according to Lucy since to their name shortly after arriving in a new town with no connections just have senior borrows money for horses hiren gets a new alias hy r un his name has changed from masonic to biblical years before the morgan affair lucy acquires a cake and beer shop on Main Street and has young Joseph pedal he wears vainly at revivals the family is able to buy land build homes and thrive while many in the rest of the world starve and die after 11 months Joseph's seniors sues instead of paying for the horses and requests a Masonic jury his prior Masonic blackball should preclude him from joining a lodge yet Alvin Joseph senior and Hyrum all become Freemasons at different lodges they keep digging for money for the next 15 years but they never ever find any and many neighbors later testify that they simply don't know how the Smith family earns money meanwhile back east many rare and expensive books have gone missing from Dartmouth there's no Scottie chronicon to be found anywhere on campus it's strange that a college founded is a Scottish religious institution does not have the Scottish religious history book Harvard has one but that would be like a book of mormon being found at Notre Dame but not at BYU Nathan moves on to Yale to form his next medical school he prefers to get his corpses from secret suppliers more medical schools continue to pop up everywhere the demand for dead bodies explodes it's applied from well organized teams yet no one ever claims credit following the pattern of the Old Testament Joseph the Smith family first goes through seven fad years in New York the multi-talented clan enjoys the fruits of three Freemasons three conjurer's three Presbyterians six of them have a basic education - the parents have a good education and one Hiram has an excellent education far exceeding the others Lucy has become a midwife and at least three family members have become failed money diggers during this time the family not only survives somehow they thrive after that the future doesn't look so bright the Smith family's luck changes complete overnight and tragedy strikes when Alvin dies kicking off seven lean years the family advertises in the local newspaper that they've camped in the graveyard with Alvin's body for five weeks just in case someone tries to rob it even though the younger boys are now a sold us Alvin was when they first moved into town any honest labor that is being done just isn't enough to pay the bills mounting deaths or two possible Smith benefactors Nathan Smith and Stephen Mac grow old and die the family loses their large home they need some new plan or total financial ruin lies just ahead a quick inventory of the resources of the most capable Smith shall they have a veritable dream team of talent Joseph's senior and Lucy the directors have a good solid education he's a freemason with connections and she's a church-going Crespi tyrion popular among their congregation he's a conjurer failed money digger but also has a talent as a writer which will be shown later when he starts selling patriarchal blessings Lucy is a capable Midwife and she also is an author as shown by the 300 page book she'll create 15 years later Hyrum the writer has both the benefits of a Lodge of freemason Brethren and the same church congregation as mom goes to he also has been a failed money digger but his offering capabilities are beyond question and his massive brain has been well trained by a first-rate education his penmanship is also flawless magic man Joseph the actor has a few tricks up his sleeve he has minimal education but as a well practiced conjurer and has the ability to quickly memorize oversight large sections from books it also doesn't hurt that he's charming and charismatic the team seeks to recreate the magic of Robert Burns and comes up with a simple three-phase plan first the three writers will create a book second Joseph will help give it a magic reveal and third the family can avoid total financial Armageddon for their surefire bestseller they decide to target the market they know the thirty thousand Freemasons right there in New York they'll use Joseph to give it a genius illiterate farmer filled with a very masonic reveal involving an angel descending Jacob's Ladder during the autumn equinox revealing buried gold plates in a stone box and Hyrum will go one better than its fellow Dartmouth alumni he'll make it indian-themed but his Indians won't just be Jews like Ethan Smith's in the view of the Hebrews his book will reveal that ancient Native Americans were actually freemasons they'll also write it in the popular King James Bible style then invoke the goal is to plagiarize but obfuscate the source material Aladin history book like the Scott a chronicon is a good choice Latin stories use phrases like ed factum to connect paragraphs this translates into and it came to pass which certainly sounds biblical and takes up a lot of space making the finished book thicker the legend of skoda and gay fellas can be used as a framework Ireland and Scotland can be swapped out with the New World Pole thing to be kicked off just before the destruction of the Temple of Solomon added bonus Latin text is full of Semitic complexity including Chi Asmus like that found in Greek and Hebrew writings the abbot of Bridger Bauer and the original compiler fordham can be used as characters to make sure even the thickest mason gets the burnsy in Masonic Wings have the first order of business for the colonists be to build a new Masonic Lodge aka Solomon's Temple have a single River in the land and name it after the Phoenicians shipbuilding port where Skoda is from make sure a prophet Jacob shows up early to give the Masonic party brethren a gia don't forget a Tree of Life some visions - an elective nine type story where a good guy cuts off a drunk bad guy's head with his own sword you know fake it Masonic for added filler we can use the story of Samson Arkham the Indian but we'll rename him Samuel the Lamanite we can take entire sections of Masonic King James Bible and just put them in somewhere but we want patriarchal sounding advice we use the teachings of Professor Johnny for the destruction just before Christ's arrival we can use the accounts of the devastation in Indonesia following the eruption of Mount Tambora we'll take a sales family blessing and we'll expand that in the King Benjamin's sermons and we'll take the names of people locations and events and scramble them up a bit let's construct a timeline to connect the chapters together and then we'll divvy up that work among the writing team for the initial protagonist the writing team didn't need inspiration just a good memory to tell a story about a family that was forced to leave their home and travel far away or one parent murmurs and wants to return to the parents land and the visionary other parent believes God has a plan for them where children are sent back to steal provisions and rare books that include scriptures in Jenny ology where the parents are surprised and happy to learn from those stolen books that they're all descended from Joseph of Egypt that when they arrive in their new land they thrive for a bet and the brothers they often fight but then they make up if the first family in the Book of Mormon was really based upon the Smith family who could be who well in Lucy's later books she repeatedly compares herself to Lehi and even offers a story where she is leading people to a new land on a boat she vividly recalls Lehi style dreams from she is 70 years old this would make sense if the dreams were always hers if Joseph Smith jr. were Nephi well he wouldn't have a younger brother also than Joseph but if dphi were really Hiram than that and a brother named Sam does make sense Joseph's senior could easily be the basis for Sariah who murmurs and wants to return to the land of her inheritance I'm sure the thought of returning to his father assails farms across Joseph seniors mind more than once these character assignments make sense for other reasons Sariah is not a biblical name but Sarah a Hogg was a high priest in the temple of Solomon and shows up all over Masonic lore gender-bending the name helps obfuscate the source Nephi is Latin for pleasant and can also be Masonic li decoded from the tribe Sarah I shall belong to Lehi is Latin for Midway but is also a location in the Bible where they asked talked and means jawbone or storyteller a most appropriate pseudonym for Lucy each thing is also an exact character match for the counterpart which by itself may seem merely coincidental until you consider that every chapter of the Book of Mormon except the one added later follows this pattern and produces a nice division of labor for the writing team that combined with the mashed-up sources would account for the multiple author voices found using computerized word print analysis one of Lucy's assigned books Alma is also Latin for nourishing and is almost always combine this alma mater which translates to nourishing mother and is also a Latin reference to a previously attended school like Dartmouth if these three were the writing team they did a nice job of giving themselves a shout-out in the opening line of the Book of Mormon I Nev I think of Hyrum having been born of goodly parents well that includes all three of them right there now this type of obvious keishon happens all the time in the tech industry and this team did a fairly good job but they didn't even have to be that clever if they had confidence that Joseph's their front man would perform his part well like any good startup the team needed some seed capital to kick things off the first possible investor was Martin Harris gullible and wealthy and in a bad marriage to his cousin he was looking for more from life including spending time with his girlfriend The Smiths had worked for him in the past including Lucy who had been the Midwife for his wife Joseph's senior and Lucy were tasked with the approach and the result was that Martin was on board Joseph jr. was assigned to land a second investor Isaac Hale was his reluctant and very wealthy father-in-law he was still angry that Joseph and Emma had eloped practical and pragmatic he gave Joseph a small cabin but made him work for everything he gave him this was helpful to Joseph personally but wasn't a help to the project or the rest of the Smith family the result was that Joseph did not end up signing him and in tears he admitted to his father-in-law that he had never been a real conjurer Joseph's role for the magic reveal is crucial he is the diversion like the disappearing coin trick his job is to draw the attention away from the writers his lack of a formal education and common manners that makes it all seem more magical this works so well but even now when people lose faith in the story about angels and gold plates they still think Joseph was a genius who wrote it all himself Joseph's true genius would be revealed later but at this stage he didn't even own a King James Bible and if he'd had most of it already committed a memory he wouldn't have needed to buy himself a copy when the Book of Mormon went to print he had a good memory maybe not photographic but still way better than average with Hiram's manuscript at the ready in albums wooden box the actual trick was pretty simple prior to a translation session Joseph upload a few pages into memory then in front of his scribe he would place his rock and his head into his hat the scribe would write whatever he was cited and there you have a magic reveal just have had a few of the tricks he could use to speed things up he could spell out words he couldn't pronounce and because of his memory he could pick up the translation at the exact point where he'd left off he could ask him about details he wasn't sure about like if Jerusalem had a wall around him to make sure Hiram wasn't tricking him eventually he'd nailed up a curtain between himself and Martin Harris this meant he could skip the whole memorizing step and didn't have to keep his head bare in the Hat all day and didn't have to look at Martin if he'd been too busy to memorize his pages or was tired of the work he could pretend he was in a fight with Emma go into the woods to pray and there he could memorize her relax and return hours later to continue coinciding with the execution of the Book of Mormon version 1.0 plan a freemason named William Morgan announces his intention to publish an ephah Masonic book in New York that would reveal the appendant ceremonies Morgan is kidnapped and murdered and Mason's are suspected the alleged kidnappers come from the same Lodge in Canandaigua that Joseph Smith senior belongs to when the trial is over the accused murderers have avoided harsh punishment anti-masonic sentiment reaches a fever pitch by mid 1828 all churches and many leaders publicly come out against masonry membership drops Masons go into hiding in New York 400 lodges close with only about 80 remaining membership Falls from the tens of thousands to less than 3,000 Thomas Paine's lost Masonic chapter of the anti-religious Age of Reason is ironically touted by Christians who are convinced of his claims that masonry is just a shell setup to secretly hide Scottish true in some worship this bombshell says anti-masonic sentiment through the roof an overtly Masonic Book of Mormon is doomed as there is no longer a market or anything Crowe masonry a partial rewrite is the Book of Mormon version 2.0 plan is to drop the overtly masonic tone instead of here to focus more on the spiritual than the historical as part of this plants were also made to restore the relative John Smith's Church of Christ from Dartmouth the team modifies the magic reveal to make the work move faster keeps the hidden masonic shout-outs in an effort to bring closeted masons on board who would be thrilled to find they had done pain one better and we're now hiding masonry inside the shell of Christianity the initial hundred and sixteen pages are stolen back by the family due to the need for the rewrite Joseph has sent home to care for his wife Emma as the Smith family debt continues to climb and Hyrum takes on debt cousin Oliver Cowdery a freemason is enlisted to speed things up he lives with the Hiram Joseph's senior and Lucie family during the winter as they clean up the manuscript Calvary is assigned the book of Helaman and stuffs it full of seemingly at the Masonic ideas Joseph and Oliver meet for the first time in April 1829 and the entire work is ready for the printers by Jim working with Oliver Joseph jr. has very little work to do as a magic reveal is rarely needed the rock and the hat-trick is still deployed on occasion and it's used to convince the witness of the book's divine origin to convince witnesses of the divine origin costumes and props from the now-empty Masonic lodges are deploying the witnesses who rely on their actual physical eyes really testify that they have seen someone who looks like an angel holding something that looks like golden plates with markings on them that they cannot read this is hardly evidence that what is printed in the Book of Mormon came from that angel or those plates that makes things easier if every witness is related to a Whitmer or a Smith it's also worth noting that every witness still alive in 1845 except William Smith and Oliver Cowdery fall for a similar yet better executed trick played by Strang with Lucy and Joseph seniors standing in as the paternal voice of God in the early revelations a nutritious organized patterned after the old church at Dartmouth many of the early members come from Freemasonry and instantly recognize the Masonic message barely concealed in the Book of Mormon they do not get caught up in the obvious and glaring errors or inaccuracies in the text because they know is former freemasons the truths could be hiding inside stories and fables that are not literally true masonry hiding inside Mormonism has also lowered the run of Jacob's Ladder the new goal is to not just make Goodman better using the new mormon priesthood there is the added goal of making bad man good unfortunately not enough copies of the book of mormon were sold to save the Smith farm Joseph's senior went to debtors prison while Hyrum in a school of the prophets was set up when the Saints migrated to Ohio and Joseph jr. and his brothers were finally given the educational opportunities similar to those Hyrum had enjoyed at Dartmouth they did not use professor Johnny's textbooks the Smith family had lots of adventures including the time Hyrum and Joseph were in Liberty jail and Hyrum wrote amazing letters that Joseph copied his revelations four days later as more and more believing Christians joined the church Christian styles histories and visions were added first by Orson Pratt and then others to create a more faith promoting narrative for the true believers several versions were needed to get it just right soon after reaching Ohio Hyrum oversaw the construction of a Masonic Lodge it was laid out properly on an east-west line it was called a temple like under Solomon's as more members joined the church the Smith family started earning regular steady incomes they gathered wealth speculated on real estate operated financial institutions hotels and steamships only the first five leaders of the Mormon Church were freemasons when Joseph finally booted up he discovered the Book of Mormon theology didn't match his so he revised it when the Saints arrived in Ohio several medical schools open including one four miles from the temple when the saints left every school closed due to grave robbing scandals after the Saints reached Nauvoo masonry was on the rise again that excited Joseph pushed the men to make sure everyone became a freemason he himself went through the three degrees and achieved Master Mason status in two days by memorizing text that takes most men months the Nauvoo endowment wasn't stolen from freemason it was designed as independent right initially an add-on freemasons were in the mob that murdered Joseph and Hyrum upset with polygamy in the way Mormons practiced masonry Brigham Young successfully navigated a secession crisis traded resources to Lucy and Emma so Lucy would not publish her book and left for Utah thinking the matter settled as an early sainted Freemason Brigham himself was one of those who had converted to Mormonism years before the first vision story when it was all Masonic illusions Brigham Young was a figurative Mormon have you ever wondered why any believing member could claim absolute knowledge that every other truth claim of the church is literally true except for the many times over its entire history where the church has repeated the pattern of openly admitting that it lied well that's because that many feel that a truth it could negatively impact the faith of others is something that should not be talked about openly but it's a figurative Mormon I believe any real truth should be openly talked about and that you should not leave a marriage breakup a family or ostracize a loved one just because they no longer believe the literal truth claims of an organization that is repeatedly admitted it lies this is not even part of the theology those who doggedly insist that truth is only found in stories that must literally be true well they should remember that other ancient storyteller who was clear his stories were not literally true but he didn't call his stories fables he called them parables thank you so much for listening to my presentation and be sure to get your copy of the Lucy cone if you have any feedback good or bad be sure to send it addy Pete Rivas at gmail.com and include the Lucy code in the header I'll try to get back to you thanks you

Channel: ExmormonFoundation

Views: 18,341

Rating: 4.7348704 out of 5

Keywords:

Id: wf3MluItWQE

Length: 61min 43sec (3703 seconds)

Published: Fri Nov 03 2017

Reddit Comments

[u/DavidABedbug]

I listened to this and found it fascinating. The author admits to some speculation but also presents a ton of information , with sources, that I never knew,

He talks about how Joes brother Hyrum was educated at a school affiliated with Dartmouth and many features of the church were lifted directly from the religious traditions taught there.

He argues rather convincingly that the Smith family had plenty of education and time and resources to create the BoM.

That’s a vast oversimplification. Hopefully many people will listen and we can discuss.

He has a lot of sources that need to be checked out as well. I haven’t tried but might if others would participate.

[u/Kumahito]

I’ve always wondered why we believe the Mormons when they say “it only took Brother Joseph two months to write the BoM!” How do they know that? All of the contemporary accounts come from fellow believers, many of whom were likely in on the con. It could’ve been the work of a decade or more for all we know.

[u/boyscout555]

I was at the SLC conference and I am glad to see the presentation.

Great work!

Thanks!

[u/Readbooks6]

Interesting theory. I thought I'd watch the first few minutes and ended up watching the entire thing.

[u/frogs2kiss]

Wow! I knew some of the information previously, but this is ExMo 2.0. Thank you!! I am looking forward to seeing sources to slyly slip into TBM conversations.

[u/galdaman]

Just watched it a few minutes ago. The presentation is rife with Aha moments. There are many possible historical points for likely plagiarism, some that could supersede existing theories such as Ethan Smith's "View of the Hebrews."

The most damning datum to me is Lucy Smith's familial link to Professor Johnny Smith and his Church of Christ. When you look at Johnny Smith's theology, the link the Mormonism is uncanny. Johnny Smith as a source of the Mormonism's ideas is certainly not out of the equation, as is Masonry.

Did anyone catch former seer stone magician Edward Kelley introducing wife sharing at the 21:44 mark? Crazy.

[u/perk_daddy]

I emailed the author, he said the book will be on amazon next month. It looks more like fun conspiracy stuff, hopefully the book will have some actual sources...

[u/astronautsaurus]

The truth really is more amazing than fiction. Interesting stuff.

[u/The_True_Zephos]

This seems too much to just now come to light. I am keen to see sources.