Book of Mormon by Joseph Smith (Translator)

Doctrine of the Mormon Cult not in the Book of Mormonby EX-Mormon

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July 05, 2009: The Book of Mormon is an enormous fraud, and the Cult of Joseph Smith has expertly used it to expand their organization, by duping those unprepared to research the "church" and it's history before joining the cult.

Missionaries ask potential converts to read the BOM, pray about it, and then ask them if they want to get baptized and join the church.

However, the BOM does not contain the main doctrines of the cult.

God's origin as a human being, living on a planet revolving around a star named Kolob.

His progression to godhood, and his continuing progression.

Plurality of gods in our universe, with our god as little more than a galactic emperor.

God's polygamous wives, which while physical give birth to non-physical spiritual children.

Matter, Spirit, and the "Intelligence" from which spirits are formed are eternal and uncreated.

God did not create the universe or our Earth. He outsourced it to his son, Jehovah - who would later become Jesus - and Michel - who would later become Adam - and the two "organized" matter into our current planet.

The premortal "Council in Heaven" in which the plan to make his children mortal to weed out the loyal is presented, and the pre-mortal Christ agrees to atone for our sins. Wherein his brother, Lucifer, wants to subject everyone to his reign.

The priesthood involves no actual education or training in any sort of priest craft, but merely transmits and confirms "authority."

Christ's atonement merely opens the door for the resurrected to continue their eternal progression.

A woman is dependent on her husband for her resurrection.

Baptism and Marriages performed vicariously for the dead.

Polygamy is the god preferred form of marriage.

Joseph Smith has the power to forgive people their sins, and to condemn people and halt their spiritual progression.

These things and more are not in the BOM.

The advantage of this volume is that it removes the versification of the text, and sets it in sentences and paragraphs that allow for more natural and less stilted reading.

Smith, as an author is not particularly impressive, and many church members are probably not aware that the book answers all the philosophical being debating in upstate New York for the decade prior to it's writing. The Book of Mormon is a polemical novel, not revealed scripture, and not an account of pre-Columbus American Indians.

For further reading on the subject see:

Out of Mormonism

The Mormon Mirage

One Nation Under Gods

No Man Knows My History

Early American Religious Fictionby dec0558

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January 03, 2009: The reviews here are interesting for a number of reasons. Most seem to be written by members of the Utah LDS Church (which many people mistakenly assume is the ONLY Mormon denomination; it is not.) The give-away is that so many of these reviews use the LDS Church's 1983 subtitle "Another Testament of Christ"--which, of course, is NOT the original title of "The Book of Mormon."
What makes this amusing is that the particular edition of "The Book of Mormon" being advertised above is published by the RLDS Church (also called "The Community of Christ") which is headquartered in Independence, Missouri--and which US law recognizes as the LEGAL heir to the original church organized near Palmyra, New York by Joseph Smith and Oliver Cowdrey in the Spring of 1830.
The RLDS Church (the Community of Christ) is the second largest Mormon denomination; it was founded by the actual blood relatives of Joseph Smith (his sons, his brother William and his sisters, his mother, paternal uncles and their fanmilies.) Except for the legal widow of Hyrum Smith--and her son by Hyrum, Joseph F. Smith--NO members of the Smith family followed Brigham Young and the Quroum of the Twelve to Utah. They stayed in the midwest--in Nauvoo and Independence--which were the sites that Joseph Smith set apart as the "gathering places" for Mormons.

I'm a Reform Mormon (www.reformmormonism.org)--which is a new Mormon denomination. Reform Mormonism is to LDSism what Reform Judaism is to Orthodox Judaism.

Reform Mormons consider ALL scripture to be man-made--that is, art. NO book is infallible. We don't consider "The Book of Mormon" to be history: the facts of Mormon history--not to mention ancient American and Middle Eastern history--simply do nor support the book as an historical record.

We consider "The Book of Mormon" to be early American religious fiction--and as such, it can be inspirational for readers open to such inspiration. The stories in the book clearly reflect the frontier Evangelical Christian practices of the 1820's. The various prophet characters sound like Methodist preachers. (Joseph Smith himself was a member of the Palmyra, New York Methodist teeenage debating organization in 1822 and 1824; in 1825 while living in Harmony, Pennsylvania he applied for membership in the local Methodist Church there--and was denied membership because of his continued involvement in treasure digging and folk-magic. The original "Church of Christ" that Joseph and Oliver Cowdrey organized in 1830 had a church government based on the Methodist's model.[The Aaronic and Melchezdek Priesthoods were FIRST introduced into Mormonism several years later--in 1834 in Kirtland, Ohio.)

The crowds who come under the influence of the prophet characters in "The Book of Mormon" react like evangelical Christians would act at a revival: they faint (are "slain in the spirit"), they speak in tongues, they shout praises and "hallelujahs"--behavior which, interestingly enough, is no longer found in any of Mormonism's various denominations. (Certainly NOT in the Utah LDS Church.)

I Also Recommend: Joseph Smith.