Episode 49: Understanding Joseph Smith’s Bible Translation (Jared Ludlow)

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BYU Religious Education

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4.8 • 1.7K Ratings

🗓️ 1 February 2022

⏱️ 52 minutes

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Summary

In the summer of 1830, the Prophet Joseph Smith began an audacious undertaking: to translate the Holy Bible. But what was this Bible “translation”? Was he reading from other languages? Was he restoring the Bible text to its earliest condition? Was it an inspired commentary? Is the JST canonized scripture? And, did Joseph ever finish the complete translation? In this episode, Dr. Jared Ludlow shares his recent publications tackling these questions and more.

Transcript

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0:00.0	By the summer of 1830 at the ripe old age of 24 years old, Joseph Smith already had two
0:05.3	monumental accomplishments under his new prophetic belt.
0:08.9	The Book of Mormon was translated and printed, and in April the church was formally organized.
0:14.5	What next for him?
0:15.5	Well, the answer came in the Bible, quite literally.
0:19.8	Just two months after the church's organization, Joseph's next prophetic mission was to translate
0:25.0	the Bible.
0:26.3	This was an audacious undertaking for a 24-year-old living in the wilderness of North America.
0:33.5	The Holy Bible was the cornerstone of Western civilization and Joseph Smith had no academic
0:38.0	training or worldly experience and had likely never read the Bible covered a cover himself.
0:44.3	Even so, he moved forward undaunted.
0:46.6	He considered this translation of the Bible a branch of his calling and had divine revelation
0:51.3	authorizing him to do it.
0:53.3	He made significant changes to Genesis, Exodus, Psalms, Isaiah, Matthew, Luke, Romans, 1 Corinthians,
0:59.8	Hebrews, James, 2 Peter and Revelation.
1:03.6	He made no changes to Ruth, Ezra, Esther, and some other Old Testament books, as well
1:09.2	as no changes to 2nd or 3rd John.
1:12.2	Famously, he called the song of Solomon uninspired.
1:16.8	The Joseph Smith translation of the Bible was a launch pad of revelation for Joseph Smith
1:22.2	himself.
1:23.6	Half of our Doctrine and Covenants revelations came during the time period when Joseph
1:28.5	was engaged translating the Bible.
	...

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