After reading through all the assigned texts this term and now reading through the book of Mormon I definitely feel differently about the book of Mormon. I just feel as though it was written in a manner that needed so badly to convince people, so it threw in all sorts of miracles that happened in America. I understand that the point of religious texts is to reach out and convince people to have faith but the book of Mormon is sometimes way over board.
I feel like John Smith wrote this book to convince and appease people so they would join his religion. Instead of being truthful he was shoving things down people's throat he thought they would want to hear. Yes, a lot of things were seriously embellished in other religious texts but with Mormonism being so new, and claiming such big things like Jesus coming down from heaven and all sorts of other things, it seems unrealistic. I'm not trying to say that Mormons are wrong or that people should ignore the book of Mormon because it seems outlandish. I just think if we all took and appreciated the book of Mormon with a grain of salt we'd all be golden.
At the end of the book of Mormon, Mormon's son Moroni actually addresses the fact that miracles do not happen any more in America, or the world for that matter. He writes, "The reason why he ceaseth to do miracles among the children of men, is because that they dwindle in unbelief, and depart from the right way, and know not the God in whom they should trust." Moroni goes on to state that it everyone believes in God and Christ wholeheartedly and doubts absolutely nothing, Christ will reveal himself to that person and miracles will once again happen.
ReplyDeleteIt makes sense that Joseph Smith would be writing the Book of Mormon to convince others and appease them by saying that Jesus came to America etc. but from watching the video about the conversion of Joseph Smith (which is also biased, no doubt) it seemed to me that he was trying to find answers for himself to the controversies that he saw in the different sects of Christianity and perhaps wanted to share these answers that he came up with the people of America to clarify what was meant in the Bible.
ReplyDelete