Where Did Joseph Smith Get the Idea for Ancient Plates? - LDS Discussions Pt. 70 | Ep. 2106
Mormon Stories Podcast
Dr. John Dehlin
4.5 ā¢ 5.7K Ratings
šļø 23 January 2026
ā±ļø 113 minutes
šļø Recording | iTunes | RSS
š§¾ļø Download transcript
Summary
Welcome to Episode 70 of our LDS Discussions series!
In this episode, our panel takes a deep dive into one of the most debated questions surrounding the Book of Mormon: were ancient metal plates a known concept in Joseph Smithās world, and are they truly comparable to the golden plates he described?
We examine historical sources from the 18th and 19th centuries that reference metal records ābrass, copper, lead, and stone āand place them within Joseph Smithās cultural and intellectual milieu. From biblical scholarship and early American speculation about Native American origins to apologistsā use of presentism, this episode carefully distinguishes between general awareness of metal inscriptions and the specific, unprecedented claims of a large golden codex containing extensive narrative text.
Along the way, we explore major figures, books, and ideas circulating before and during Joseph Smithās lifetime, assess whether these sources were likely known to him, and ask a crucial question: at what point does probability break down ānot because of a single anachronism, but because of the sheer scale and complexity of the plates described in the Book of Mormon?
This conversation builds toward a detailed timeline of Joseph Smithās environment, highlighting how concepts expanded, evolved, and were ultimately synthesized into something entirely new.
Leave a comment letting us know if you like this format with John Dehlin being ānot home.ā
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Good morning, everyone, and thank you for joining us on another episode of Mormon Stories podcast, LDS Discussions Edition. |
| 0:07.0 | It is Friday, January 16th, 2026, and we are joined this morning for our episode on Where Did Joseph Smith Come Up with the Idea of Gold Plates by Julia Sanders and Nemo the morning. |
| 0:20.1 | Good morning, both of you. How are you? Good. How are |
| 0:22.6 | you guys? Very well. Good. Julia, do you mind introducing yourself and then we'll turn it over to |
| 0:27.9 | Nemo to do the same? Sure. So I'm Julia. I run the TikTok, Instagram, YouTube for analyzing |
| 0:35.4 | Mormonism. I grew up Mormon. I served a mission. I went to |
| 0:38.8 | BYU, Idaho. I'm getting my master's degree, and I'll get that this year, hopefully. |
| 0:42.9 | And I've been on, this is episode 70 for LDS discussions, and I think I've been on somewhere |
| 0:47.3 | in the mid-50s. So, yeah. Great. I'm Nemo. Hi, everyone. |
| 0:56.8 | I've been on since I think episode two. |
| 1:00.8 | And I'm glad to be here, though, slightly disappointed because I thought Colby we'd agree you'd do the John DeLine impression to open. |
| 1:04.4 | And, you know, the people need to hear it, I think. |
| 1:07.4 | I know better than that. |
| 1:08.5 | But yes, I'll go ahead and introduce myself. |
| 1:10.6 | I am not John DeLyn. Instead, I am your guest host for today, Colby Reddish. I am a, I like to say, a prolific post-Morman podcast guest, but don't have my own podcast or anything like that. I'm a licensed attorney that left the church in 2022. My first kind of entry into the space was an |
| 1:29.1 | appearance on Mormon Stories, episodes 1550 and 1551, where we talked about our faith |
| 1:34.9 | Christ, my wife and I's faith crisis, which was catalyzed by our sitting bishop, pleading |
| 1:39.2 | guilty to several sex abuse crimes. So that is kind of my background. |
| 1:45.2 | One of the reasons I am happy to be the guest host for today's episode is because the LDS |
| 1:50.7 | discussion series is aimed at doing as much as we can to do an objective evaluation of |
| 1:56.8 | LDS Church Truth claims. |
| 1:58.9 | Nemo, do you mind giving the folks kind of an overview of the LDS discussion series since you're |
... |
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