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Mormon Stories Podcast

1338: Haley Wilson Lemmón - The BYU Undergrad Who Discovered Joseph Smith's Plagiarisms in his Bible "Translation"

Mormon Stories Podcast

Dr. John Dehlin

Religion & Spirituality

4.55.7K Ratings

🗓️ 19 July 2020

⏱️ 160 minutes

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

Over the past several decades. credible Mormon-themed scholarship has determined beyond any reasonable doubt that Joseph Smith's claim have special powers to "translate" ancient languages was not true, and that Joseph often relied on plagiarism to produce his "revelations."  Up until recently, at least three clear instances of false translation by Joseph Smith were widely known: the Book of Mormon, the Book of Abraham, and the Kinderhook Plates.

In the summer of 2015, something truly remarkable happened.  A BYU undergraduate, along with her professor, discovered a fourth example of false translation, and yet another example of plagiarism on the part of Joseph Smith - this time in the canonized "Joseph Smith Translation" of the Holy Bible (found in modern LDS scripture)

Join me and scholar Haley Wilson Lemmón today as we discuss this groundbreaking research she conducted at BYU, along side professor Thomas A. Wayment -- as together they discovered literally hundreds of instances where Joseph Smith plagiarized portions of the Joseph Smith "Translation" of the Bible directly from Adam Clarke's Bible Commentary.

Today's story includes:

  • Haley's early years growing up as a highly devout Mormon girl and young woman who struggled significantly with undiagnosed religious anxiety (possibly scrupulosity).
  • Haley's LDS mission to Panama.
  • Haley's discovery of Joseph Smith's plagiarism, as she was working as a BYU undergraduate research assistant under Dr. Thomas A. Wayment.
  • Haley's deep struggle with her Mormon faith once she began studying the authenticity of Mormon scripture and other truth claims.
  • Haley's troubling brush with the BYU Honor Code Office, which almost resulted in her being expelled from BYU.
  • How Haley's name was almost removed from the publishing of her research with Dr. Wayment.
  • A review of Haley's current views on LDS Church truth claims.

As a part of this interview, we will be discussing in-depth the article/chapter "A Recently Recovered Source: The Use of Adam Clarke’s Bible Commentary in Joseph Smith’s Bible Translation" that she co-authored with Thomas A. Wayment, which recently appeared in the newly released book "Producing Ancient Scripture: Joseph Smith's Translation Projects in the Development of Mormon Christianity," edited by Michael MacKay, Mark Ashurst-McGee, and Brian M. Hauglid.

Transcript

Click on a timestamp to play from that location

0:00.0

Hello everyone and welcome to another edition of

0:02.8

Mormon Stories podcast. I'm your host John Dillin.

0:05.2

It's July 18th, 2020.

0:07.6

Today we have what I feel is one of those really historic

0:12.6

Mormon Stories podcast episodes akin to the Michael Coe or the Tom Phillips or

0:18.1

the Brent Metcalfe interview.

0:19.9

Today we are going to be interviewing Haley Wilson Lamon.

0:24.6

Some of you will know her name, others of you won't.

0:28.4

We've covered the problems with Book of Mormon

0:31.1

historicity on Mormon Stories podcast.

0:34.0

We've covered problems with the Book of Abraham,

0:36.7

historicity. We've talked about the Kidderic plates,

0:40.3

but this is an amazing story that strikes to the heart of Mormon Church.

0:45.6

Truth claims. Haley was raised Mormon. We're going to talk about her story,

0:51.1

serving a mission, etc. She eventually ends up a B.

0:54.8

Y. U. as an undergrad. As she's studying along with the professor,

1:00.0

Thomas Wayman, at B. Y. U., she stumbles on to a research project and discovers

1:05.7

that Joseph Smith plagiarized that you can find instances of plagiarism.

1:12.8

Let's just say hundreds of instances of plagiarism in Joseph Smith's translation

1:19.4

of the Holy Bible. We knew about the Book of Abraham. We knew about

1:24.9

the Book of Mormon. We knew about the Kidderic plates, but it wasn't until a few years ago

1:30.6

that a budding female scholar out of B. Y. U. teaches us all that there's yet a fourth

...

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