Introduction to the Book of Moses

John Dehlin [00:00:01] Okay, so tell us a little bit about the Book of Moses, okay. And how it, you know, where it came from and how we might learn something applying higher criticism to it.

David Bokovoy [00:00:13] Okay, so the Book of Moses is a complicated book, actually, because it starts off as an individual revelation. It's now included as part of Joseph Smith's inspired translation of the Bible.

John Dehlin [00:00:27] But where did Joseph get the. Where did the text. The original. Where did Joseph claim it came from?

David Bokovoy [00:00:31] The Book of Moses, as it's identified as a revelation. So he doesn't have a manuscript. It all comes just from his mind.

John Dehlin [00:00:42] Okay.

David Bokovoy [00:00:43] From Revelation, it's identified specifically as a revelation. And that would be Moses, Chapter one. And what that does is it provides a new introduction, a new Zitzen leben. I'll use that term again. A new setting in life for the opening chapters of Genesis. It takes the creation stories, it takes Adam and Eve, it takes all of that material and puts it into the context of a revelation that Moses receives on an exceedingly high mountain, and then he is then commanded to write a book about.

David Bokovoy [00:01:17] So it takes the tradition of Mosaic authorship of the Pentateuch and canonizes it in LDS thought. And we've just discussed the fact that, well, Moses didn't write that material, so it changes its meaning. But what I show in the book is I don't think that that's a bad thing as long as we recognize that a change is taking place from the way that these sources functioned in antiquity and the way that it changes it, I argue in the book, is that it changes it to an endowment experience or a temple or revelation. That's what an exceedingly high mountain is and function and how one functioned in the ancient world.

David Bokovoy [00:01:52] It was a connection between heaven and earth. So it transforms the way that we as Latter Day Saints, see that as prophetic material, as inspired endowment material, as temple material, and gives it really sacred meaning. So I. I love what the Book of Moses does. I think it's fantastic. I think it's brilliant. I articulate that in the book, but it's clearly not a restoration of a source that was once written down by Moses and that was included in the Pentateuch.

John Dehlin [00:02:24] Okay. And so just to drill a little bit down on that, based on kind of my inadequate understanding. So, first of all, it's interesting to note that Joseph is claiming to be able to produce scripture without any source text.

David Bokovoy [00:02:38] Yes.

John Dehlin [00:02:38] So for those who are like, well, Book of Abraham and Book of Mormon, if he didn't use the plates, if he didn't use the papyrus, you Know, that doesn't make sense that he would just generate scripture through revelation. Well, the book of Moses is an example where he. That's exactly what he did.

David Bokovoy [00:02:55] Yeah, and there are others as well.

John Dehlin [00:02:56] Book of John, didn't he. There's some scroll in some cave where he somehow channels the scroll.

David Bokovoy [00:03:02] DNC7 and you have DNC section 93 which supposedly restores some of the author of the Gospel of John's writings that he. That that were lost and that didn't exist.

John Dehlin [00:03:13] So it's pretty clear that Joseph felt like he had the ability to generate scripture where there was no source document to translate from.

David Bokovoy [00:03:22] Yeah, absolutely. He does this over and over again.

John Dehlin [00:03:24] Okay, so again, to kind of really put a fine point on it, Moses couldn't have written what we now know as the Book of Moses because why?

David Bokovoy [00:03:38] Because it is a new introduction to Genesis 1 through 2, which we know he was not responsible for and that were written centuries after he would have lived.

John Dehlin [00:03:52] So if Moses didn't write Genesis 1 and 2 and the book of Moses is a riff on Genesis 1 and 2, Moses would never have written that.

David Bokovoy [00:04:03] But we should have been able to see that even without historical criticism, just by being careful readers of the text. Because Moses isn't talking about himself in first person. It's all, you know, third person references. Then Moses did that, Moses did that. And first person forms were known. Why wouldn't, if he was really was writing this down about himself, why wouldn't he have just said something like we see in the Book of Mormon and I Nephi having been born of goodly parents and I Moses having, you know, gone up onto a mountaintop and done this. It's all about him. It's about him. It's not something that he wrote down.

John Dehlin [00:04:33] Do you know if he claimed it was a translation Book of Moses?

David Bokovoy [00:04:37] No, I don't, I don't know that Joseph Smith ever did.

John Dehlin [00:04:40] Okay. I, I have here written in my notes that it was an outgrowth of treasure digging. Did, did I get that from, from the book? Is that something that you're familiar with

David Bokovoy [00:04:51] that idea with the Book of Moses? I don't see it there. I mean certainly the Book of Mormon there.

John Dehlin [00:04:57] Okay, okay.

David Bokovoy [00:04:58] But not necessarily Book of Moses. But I don't know. Not that I see.

John Dehlin [00:05:02] Okay. And you write something about Joseph's self prophecy, Joseph prophesying of himself in the Book of Moses.

David Bokovoy [00:05:12] Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:05:14] Does that appear, does that happen?

David Bokovoy [00:05:16] Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:05:17] Does Moses prophesy of Joseph?

David Bokovoy [00:05:18] No, not. I mean that stuff is all added to, to again actualize, make Relevant. Joseph Smith and put c. Find him in the text. Find him in that.

John Dehlin [00:05:28] So when Joseph writes the Book of Moses as if he's Moses, he injects himself into.

David Bokovoy [00:05:36] Yes, and as I explain in the book, that is a venerable, respected way of creating scripture throughout history.

John Dehlin [00:05:42] What do you mean? Well, because it is in the Book of Mormon too, right?

David Bokovoy [00:05:46] Yeah, it's. You know, the term that I use is pseudepigrapha.

John Dehlin [00:05:49] Okay, tell us what that word, that's a big word. What does that mean?

David Bokovoy [00:05:52] So pseudo, like false. Right. And figrafa, which is writing a falsely attributed writing. The Bible is filled with scriptural text that are written in the place of ancient authority figures, prophets, patriarchs, priests and, and, and written as if it came from those individuals, as is the New Testament. We have lots of, for example, second Peter, which is clearly a very late source in the New Testament and impossible and possibly attributed to Peter. But it's written as if Peter was the voice to address the needs of that community and to give it authority. That happens all the time. And Joseph Smith does that in the creation of his scripture, which is what I point out.

David Bokovoy [00:06:34] And I'm not saying that therefore it's all good and fine, but it is a way for a faithful person who sees this material and is aware of it to understand, ah, Joseph Smith is just doing what every other prophet had done, writing in the authoritative voice of someone from the past, couching his revelation in that person's.

John Dehlin [00:06:55] So people are going to take it more seriously, whatever revelation Joseph wants to reveal, if he claims it was Moses that wrote it versus if he claims he wrote it sometimes.

David Bokovoy [00:07:05] But I also point out in the book that Joseph Smith didn't need to do that.

Pseudepigraphy Versus Forgery in Scripture

John Dehlin [00:07:08] Right. Because he had written his own scripture.

David Bokovoy [00:07:10] He had already was producing his own scripture, so he didn't have to do that.

John Dehlin [00:07:13] But it gives it an extra oomph.

David Bokovoy [00:07:15] Certainly does. It shows. And it shows that he has that umph, for lack of a better term. Right. That he, this is a guy, he's totally tuned in with and in harmony with the prophets of the past.

John Dehlin [00:07:26] So what keeps us from just saying, well, Mark Hoffman, that was pseudepigrapha, like he was writing, you know, documents. Again, just trying to enlighten us, but using other people's names as an authoritative source. What's the difference between forgery in pseudepigraph? And I actually looked it up because there is a hierarchy of sort of authoritative and non authoritative sources.

David Bokovoy [00:07:49] Yeah, I met, you know, Bart Ehrman, who is a great new Testament scholar. You interviewed him on Mormon stories and did a great job. He has a book called Forged where he talks about. And he uses that term forgery for these biblical books.

David Bokovoy [00:08:03] He's one of my favorite scholars. It's a great book. I hesitate to use that term forgery, because I think it implies so much on, you know, from a modern perspective that I do not know, really captured the intents and viewpoints that the creators of that material had.

David Bokovoy [00:08:25] So I hesitate to use terms such as that, you know, and a part of it is, you know, in the. It's. It's up to every individual to decide, is what Joseph Smith produced, is it spiritually viable? Does it feed your soul? Does it make you a better human?

David Bokovoy [00:08:45] Is it promoting good? Then it's good. And if to the extent that it is harmful or destructive to individuals or to communities, it needs to be jettisoned.

John Dehlin [00:08:56] Right. And this is something I think the listeners and. And viewers will find interesting. I just googled pseudepigrapha. I basically googled what's the difference between pseudepigrapha and forgery. And I got a Wikipedia article that talks about seven levels of authenticity of a text, and I think it's really cool. The highest level is literal authorship, where a church leader writes a letter in his own hand. So that's like the most authentic. The second is dictation. And we have all this with Joseph Smith, right. I think. Did he write some stuff in his own hand? He probably did at some point.

David Bokovoy [00:09:37] Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:09:38] Some journals or whatever. So. So that's number one. This step down is dictation, where Joseph or a leader dictates a letter word for word, to. To some sort of scribe, or it says ammonis.

David Bokovoy [00:09:50] What is that word that means a scribe? It's a technical term for a scribe.

John Dehlin [00:09:53] What's the word? And ammonunsis. I've never heard that word before. Then the third is delegated authorship, which is a church leader describes the basic content of an intended letter to a disciple or a scribe. Then there's posthumous authorship, where a church leader dies and his disciples finish a letter that he had intended to write, sending it posthumously in his name.

John Dehlin [00:10:22] Then there's apprentice authorship, where a church leader dies, and disciples who had been authorized to speak for him while he was alive continue to do so by writing letters in his name years or decades after his death. But they knew him or her, and they probably knew their teachings. And so they're just trying to carry on and spread the gospel as they heard it from that prophet. Right. Then there's honorable pseudepigraphy, which is, as you say, a church leader dies, admirals seek to honor him by writing letters in his name as a tribute to his influence and in a sincere belief that they are responsible bearers of his tradition.

John Dehlin [00:11:03] So it kind of speaks to intent. Is your intent to deceive, to manipulate for your own gain, or are you truly trying to honor that leader and write it as a tribute and with the sincere belief, you know, that what you're writing is good?

David Bokovoy [00:11:19] Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:11:19] I think that's what this article is basically using describing as a way to distinguish between that and forgery, which is the last level, which is a church leader obtains sufficient prominence that either before or after his death, people seek to exploit his legacy by forging letters in his name, presenting him as a supporter of their own ideas, not even trying to remain true to the original source, but instead just shamelessly injecting your own ideas and exploiting that person's name by trying to inject that into the writing.

David Bokovoy [00:11:59] Yeah. And I see Joseph Smith doing a little bit of all of that.

John Dehlin [00:12:03] Wait, all of it?

David Bokovoy [00:12:04] Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:12:04] Even the last? Sure. Oh, okay, cool.

David Bokovoy [00:12:08] I think. I mean, there's no question that he. He's, you know, the creation of Scripture not to exploit them and like to do bad things. I think he always believed in his heart that he was convinced himself, even when he was doing with things with plural marriage and whatnot.

John Dehlin [00:12:24] You could argue. DNC132. Yeah, he's basically saying God. God's saying this.

David Bokovoy [00:12:28] Yeah. And I think.

John Dehlin [00:12:29] But you don't believe God said this.

David Bokovoy [00:12:30] No, no, not at all. But I think so. And it was.

John Dehlin [00:12:33] And clearly he probably wanted to have sex with some other women.

David Bokovoy [00:12:35] Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:12:36] So in that sense, it would have been forgery.

David Bokovoy [00:12:39] Yeah. But I. But I don't think I know. My sense is that Joseph Smith really believed that he was being true and authentic to God and. And to the prophets that followed him,

John Dehlin [00:12:51] his understanding of Scripture and ancient.

David Bokovoy [00:12:55] Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:12:55] Prophets and theology and doctrine and the restoration. He was sincere.

David Bokovoy [00:13:01] I do believe he was very sincere.

John Dehlin [00:13:04] Yeah.

David Bokovoy [00:13:04] There's no question in my mind that he was sincere. But I know deep in his heart that he wanted to profit from the creation of Scripture and increase his authority, increase exposure to women, increase funds and that the church. I mean, there are lots of reasons. It's never just a black and white issue. Not when it comes to psychology. And you know this better than anyone, John. I mean, to say that he was motivated by pure evil or pure good or whatever. It Just that would be naive on our few human.

John Dehlin [00:13:34] Few humans are that binary.

David Bokovoy [00:13:36] Yeah, exactly.

John Dehlin [00:13:36] Right, right. And humans can fool themselves.

David Bokovoy [00:13:40] Definitely.

John Dehlin [00:13:40] All the time.

David Bokovoy [00:13:41] Sure.

John Dehlin [00:13:43] Really quickly. As you know, your book authoring the Old Testament talks about the Book of Moses. You mentioned briefly apologists that try and find Near Eastern connections with the Book of Moses. It mentions the control of water, a divine council, earth cursed but cleansed, and an emotional God. I'm guessing that farms people and Maxwell Institute people have tried to sort of validate the historicity or the authenticity of the Book of Mormon as sort of being sourced from ancient text by finding any parallels they could between Near Eastern writings and the Book of Moses. What are your thoughts on that?

Evaluating the Book of Moses Honestly

David Bokovoy [00:14:22] And I point some out in my book is you, I like you controlling the waters and things like that and. But I present it from the perspective of not that this shows that it's an originally had some sort of ancient core, but know that it's Joseph Smith being able to, through his spiritual religious genius, to be able to tap into some incredible ancient constructs in the production of the scripture. So that's a different viewpoint. I wouldn't see it because that's one of my problems with apologetic works such as that is that you may take, oh, it is impressive that Moses is controlling the water like God, and God's ability to control the water is one of the central ancient constructs that we see time and time again in the Hebrew Bible.

David Bokovoy [00:15:09] Traditionally, apologists might grab to that and then just ignore all of the other things that I address in my book that should show that it's impossible for Moses to have written that material. And I think scholars need to be consistent. Sure. Go ahead. Let's. Let's point out the beauties, the intricacies, the way that it captures ancient constructs sometimes forgotten. But let's also not cover up all of the evidence that works against traditional claims of orthodoxy, because there's a lot of it out there.

John Dehlin [00:15:35] So for you, there's probably no credibility that the Book of Moses is historical or.

David Bokovoy [00:15:41] No, no.

John Dehlin [00:15:41] Written by Moses or any of that?

David Bokovoy [00:15:43] No, none. None of it. I, I couldn't accept any of that as ancient.

John Dehlin [00:15:47] Okay, Phil, Bar you have you. You quote Phil Barlow saying that something can still be scripture even if it's not historical.

David Bokovoy [00:15:53] Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:15:54] What. What do you mean by that? Or what does Phil mean by that?

David Bokovoy [00:15:57] Well, you know, I won't speak for Phil, but I mean for me, I mean, what that cut. Cuts into what scripture is. Is scripture something that is God breathed? Or is scripture something that is Holy and revered by a community and upheld as a standard of orthodoxy and tradition. You know, as we've talked about, obviously the Quran is scripture and the Upanishads are scripture. These are all scripture, but doesn't mean necessarily that they were literally given by the gods or reflect historical reality.

John Dehlin [00:16:28] Scripture is.

David Bokovoy [00:16:29] Scripture is a. A text that an individual or community upholds as a sacred guide for their life.

John Dehlin [00:16:43] Got it. And to end this section and listeners, we're gonna. And viewers, we're gonna. We're gonna end in just a couple minutes, grab lunch, and then we're gonna come back. If you have time. Do you have time to.

David Bokovoy [00:16:56] Yeah, we can do that. We gotta do Book Abraham.

John Dehlin [00:16:58] Oh, yeah, for sure. And Book of Mormon. So we're. But what time do you have to leave today?

David Bokovoy [00:17:03] I'm pretty free today.

John Dehlin [00:17:04] Okay. Okay. So we are going to come back and talk about. Don't go away. We're going to talk about Book of Abraham and Book of Mormon and New Testament and Doctrine and Covenants in a final section. But end with, is there anything beautiful in the Old Testament or the Book of Moses? What do you find as beautiful or interesting as someone who may even be a little bit more secular than you were even when you wrote this book a few years ago just to end what's beautiful and worthwhile about these books?

David Bokovoy [00:17:34] So for the Hebrew Bible, this is material that has been deemed and held sacred for centuries, that has helped to construct Western civilization. This is a book that presents the stories about the past that were believed by an ancient people to define their place in the cosmos.

David Bokovoy [00:17:56] I. That's beautiful. There's be. There's beautiful morality and teachings of inspiration and kindness and love and compassion. The story of Ruth, my goodness. Story of absolute devotion by this. These two women and living in a patriarchal society where they would have been destitute and homeless and using their creativity, their strength, their power to be able to overcome that environment. That's incredibly inspiring, as are many of the theological views about God. I love the portrayal of God in the Hebrew Bible. God is. People see it oftentimes as being jealous and vindictive. And there are those components, of course. But I also see that God, who is so sensitive, so loving, that he actually cares about what humans have to say about him that matters to Him.

David Bokovoy [00:18:39] We see that in the Psalms all the time. The psalmist will say, God, if I die, heal me, Heal me. Heal me in the Psalms of individual amendment, and if I die, there'll be one less person to praise you. It's a Motivation for God to intervene. And I think that's beautiful, as is the construct of Moses when he's in the wilderness with the people and you see the story of where Moses, where God speaks to Moses and he's like, I'm going to wipe the Israelites out. And Moses like, no, wait, what will people say about you that you led your people out here to just destroy them?

John Dehlin [00:19:07] He's kind of bargaining with God.

David Bokovoy [00:19:09] And it's based upon influence. God, that God is so loving, so sensitive, so concerned that he literally cares about what humans think about him. It's a beautiful idea, beautiful construct. I love it. I just. I think it's incredibly inspirational. I think it is obviously scripture and it's. I believe it's inspired, but it's, you know, got a lot of problems front. Yeah, of course.

John Dehlin [00:19:34] And same thing about Book of Moses. You find beauty there.

David Bokovoy [00:19:36] I. Absolute beauty in it, as I articulated in the book. I think what Joseph Smith. Smith did with the opening chapters of Genesis is incredible because he transforms it into a temple. Reading a. Something that is. That takes place in the setting in life is now changed from just reading this ancient source to something that relates to Latter Day Saints and in the context of our temple experiences and sacred encounters with the divine and those buildings. So, yeah, I think it's. Yeah. Granted, a traditional believer will look at this and at first it may prove shocking and uncomfortable, but I think in the long run, not that I have all the answers, but that there are ways of looking at this material critically and historically that preserve the sanctity of what we're reading.

John Dehlin [00:20:26] So for you, the Old Testament and Book of Moses have value. Even if you don't believe in an anthropomorphism morphic God or a chosen blood of Israel or an Abraham or a Moses, maybe even did or didn't exist. For you, there's still deep value.

David Bokovoy [00:20:41] Oh, absolutely.

John Dehlin [00:20:42] All right.

David Bokovoy [00:20:43] Yeah, absolutely.

Introducing the Book of Abraham

John Dehlin [00:20:46] So now what we have to do is we have to apply historical criticism to the remaining Mormon scripture that we have yet to discuss. So we've talked about the Old Testament, talked about Book of Moses, at least chronologically, in terms of historical figures, Abraham would come next. Now, we have had Brett Metcalf on Mormon stories and we've talked a little bit about Book of Abraham. He certainly is a scholar. But it turns out you've done a whole Doug Fabrizio Radio west episode on the Book of Abraham. So you've dug into that issue as well?

David Bokovoy [00:21:20] Oh, yeah, extensively. Yeah, that's right. I did the Radio west interview. Right after the. With Doug, right. After the. Right after the Gospel topic essay came out, I was doing a postdoc in Mormon Studies at the University of Utah, teaching the Book of Mormon as literature there through the Languages and Literature program. And. And he invited me to come on, and we had a great conversation a couple years ago now.

John Dehlin [00:21:46] Yeah. So you. You know a bit about the Book of Abraham controversy or story, as it is, as it were. So let's just pretend, at least an introductory level, that there are listeners that kind of want to know the basics of the Book of Abraham, give us a little bit of background and history about it, and then let's apply some of this historical criticism to our understanding of that book as well. And what you could teach us about that whole piece of Mormon scripture.

David Bokovoy [00:22:17] Good. Yeah. Well, Joseph Smith, as we've mentioned, was fascinated by the ancient world, by ancient scripture. And during a time period in Kirtland, Ohio, when things were starting to get a little bit difficult for him from an administrative perspective, there were times. It was a time of renovation, a time of change in the 1830s. And he, a traveling salesman by the name of Michael Chandler had purchased some mummies and Egyptian documents and that he was traveling around like a traveling salesman showing this material to people. And he heard that Joseph Smith was interested in those types of things and thought maybe he could make a sale.

David Bokovoy [00:22:57] So he traveled to Kirtland, Ohio. The mummies and papyri that he had in his possession were purchased by Joseph Smith. He actually went to the leaders of the faith community and they raised the funds. And then Joseph Smith set about trying to translate that material. And in the production, in the process of that, he created what we now have canonized as scripture in the LDS Church as the Book of Abraham.

David Bokovoy [00:23:22] The basics of it. But, yeah, probably more than like just talking about the actual translation process and its connection with the various documents that kind of illustrate from an historical perspective what Joseph Smith was doing in the creation of that material and how he was using the papyri.

David Bokovoy [00:23:43] We can actually avoid that. That conversation and just look directly at how source criticism, how higher criticism of the Bible sheds light on the authorship and origin of the Book of Abraham, which is not something that is typically done most of the discussions surrounding it, either from the critics perspective or from the apologist perspective, is, you know, talking about the length of the scroll that was in Joseph Smith's perspective or in his. In his possession or how that scroll then relates to the production process, what he was doing. All of those things are very important.

David Bokovoy [00:24:21] But if we Just look at the actual book itself, the text itself that we have, and use the skills that we've discussed so far in higher criticism. It sheds significant light on. On this sacred text.

John Dehlin [00:24:35] So I guess there are a few questions that listeners have. One is just trying to get to the bottom of the extent to which, as I understand it, when Joseph Smith produced the Book of Abraham, he's telling people that I had the papyru, and I translated it from the Gift and Power of God from Egyptian into English, and it was written by Abraham's hand. As I understand it, that's kind of what Joseph Smith is claiming.

David Bokovoy [00:25:03] By his own hand, upon papyrus.

John Dehlin [00:25:05] By his own hand upon papyrus. So, of course, to a lot of Mormons, there's just the question of, is it authentic? Is it original? Is it really what Joseph Smith claimed, the writings of Abraham? And then there's sort of like, if it isn't, what was Joseph Smith thinking?

John Dehlin [00:25:27] You know, and how credible can it be as scripture if Joseph either lied or misrepresented what it was, in that case, maybe it would have been pseudepigrapha, or if he thought he was translating but really wasn't. What does that mean exactly? If somehow in his mind, he felt like he was translating and producing this, but he didn't even understand what he was doing?

John Dehlin [00:25:50] But I think what I heard you say is you can get to some of these questions. Ignoring the hieroglyphs, ignoring what was actually on the papyrus, ignoring any Egyptology of trying to tie whatever is on the remnant, extant portions of the scrolls with the text that he produced. You're saying that through historical criticism, we can get to understand some of these questions through a different means altogether. Is that what I heard you say?

David Bokovoy [00:26:19] Exactly.

John Dehlin [00:26:20] Okay.

David Bokovoy [00:26:20] Exactly.

Abraham, Canaan, and Historical Context

John Dehlin [00:26:21] So teach us, Brother David, enlightened us.

David Bokovoy [00:26:24] I've got my scriptures open ready for round two of Sunday School.

John Dehlin [00:26:26] All right.

David Bokovoy [00:26:28] I was thinking about how we might lay this out and how I might best illustrate it. And I think the way to do that is to actually start with the book of Genesis and with the story of Abraham as it's presented therein. So beginning with Genesis, chapter 11, where Abraham is introduced in a lengthy genealogical list, we then jump to the narrative portion, and that's. I'm looking at it. It's in verses 28. So basically, 28 through the end of the chapter, verse 32, I'll read that Haran died before his father Tara in the land of his Nativity in Ur of the Chaldees, and Abram and Nahor took them wives.

David Bokovoy [00:27:06] The Name of Abram's wife was Sarai. And the name of Nahor's wife Milka, the daughter of Haran, the father of Milka and the father of Iskah. But Sarai was barren. She had no child. And Terah took Abram his son and Lot, the son of Haran, his son's son. And Sarai his daughter's in daughter in law and his son Abram's wife. And they went forth with them from Ur of the Chaldees to go into the land of Canaan. And they came unto Haran and dwelt there.

David Bokovoy [00:27:35] And the days of Terah were 205 years. And Tara died in Haran. Okay, so there's this story as an introduction of Abraham. We learn that who his father is that they live in the land of Ur in southern Mesopotamia. And going back, it has to be southern Mesopotamia, which presents a challenge to the Book of Mormon because of its the supposed connections between Egypt and Ur, where Abraham comes from. If you'll recall the Book of Abraham, it talks about the priest of the Pharaoh and Abraham being sacrificed on an altar. Mormon historians have apologists, I should say, have wanted to push Ur to a more northern location so that there might be some Egyptian influence.

David Bokovoy [00:28:16] But that is an argument that is outside of byu, not taken very seriously. From my perspective would we would lose a lot of what we see happening with the Bible. Without Babel, there would be no Bible. So if we think about it going back what we discussed in the previous podcast. Genesis 1 is influenced by the Babylonian story of enuma Elish, Genesis 2 through 3 influenced by traditions from the Epic of Gilgamesh. Here, the Flood story comes from Mesopotamia, the Tower of Babel Babylonian polemic, the law, the laws, the legal collection.

David Bokovoy [00:28:54] From the connection between the Covenant Collection in Exodus 21 and the code of Hammurabi, the oldest complete law collection from ancient Babylon, the Assyrian vassal treaties of Esserhadden, those connect with Deuteronomy, all of this connection. So it's very important from a biblical perspective to show Abram, the father of the Israelite nation, leaving Mesopotamia and coming to the land of Canaan, the Promised Land. It's actually a reversal of the exile where the Jewish community goes into the land. It goes out of the Promised Land and into Babylon. So Abram has to leave Mesopotamia and go into the Promised Land. It's a reversal of that exilic experience.

David Bokovoy [00:29:36] So just from the perspective of the Bible, Abram has to be linked with southern Mesopotamia, which is where 99.9% of all biblical scholars would put him. That presents an historical challenge for the. The narrative as presented in the book of Abraham. But it's even more than that, John, because what I just read to you in that introduction, going back to our previous discussion, that all stems from the priestly document.

David Bokovoy [00:29:59] Notice what happens here. Abraham's father takes him out of the land of Ur, and it already identifies and says Abraham's father is going to take him into the land of Canaan. Then if we ignore the chapter division and just move from Genesis chapter 11 right into 12, then we read, now the Lord said unto Abram, get thee out of thy country and from thy kindred, and from thy father's house, and unto a land that I will show thee. It's repetition and it's inconsistent because in the priestly narrative, which stems before this, in chapter 11 that we just read, Abraham leaves the land of the Chaldeans.

David Bokovoy [00:30:42] He leaves Ur with his dad, who's very much alive, and they're leaving, and they're going on a journey to Canaan. Then this next story it tells, God speaks to him and says, hey, get out of the land of Ur and leave your dad behind. See, there's. There's inconsistency there. But it makes sense when we recognize that the second narrative in Genesis 12:1, 2 is from an entirely different historical document, edited and compiled together in the book of Genesis as Genesis 11 and Genesis chapter 12. Genesis 11 stems from the priestly narrative. And this first part of 12, where we have Yahweh mentioned, is J or the J source, right?

David Bokovoy [00:31:20] Now, if we jump then to the actual book of Abraham that Joseph Smith produces in Kirtland, Ohio, watch what happens. It not only is the story all presented in first person as if Abraham himself is now telling the account.

John Dehlin [00:31:39] Unlike Moses.

David Bokovoy [00:31:40] Yeah, unlike what we see in the

John Dehlin [00:31:41] book of Moses is not first person, right?

David Bokovoy [00:31:43] Yeah. We have chapter two of Abram. Now, the Lord God caused the famine to wax sore in the land of Ur in so much that Haran my brother died, and Terah my father yet lived in the land of Ur of the Chaldees. And it came to pass that I, Abram, Ham, took Sarai to wife, and Nahor my brother, took Milka to wife and was the who was the daughter of Haran. All of that information right there is a reflection of the priestly Source in Genesis 11. It's a revision of that.

David Bokovoy [00:32:14] But then, now here's the J material, verse 3. Now, the Lord had said unto me, abraham, get thee out of thy country and from thy kindred and from thy father's house and unto the land that I will show thee. So notice how those are two different historical documents that contradict one another that have been brought together in the Book of Abraham as if it is one single harmonious narrative put into the words of Abraham.

David Bokovoy [00:32:39] And that is an illustration of how source criticism presents direct challenges to the claims, traditional claims and assumptions regarding the Book of Abraham. How could this come from Abraham when we know that these are two separate historical sources written years, many centuries after he would have supposedly lived? And that's just one illustration of many, including the end of the Book of Abraham, which is going to again present a retelling of the opening chapters of Genesis with the priestly creation story and then the j creation story as if it's one harmonious text, all presented as if it's divine revelation from Abraham.

David Bokovoy [00:33:20] So I don't even know from my perspective, it really, I think the apologetic critic arguments that get into, you know, trying to analyze the papyri that is still in the church's possession and Joseph Smith working with it, to me, those are silly arguments, interesting historical arguments, very significant, but silly in the sense of, you know, as if there's an apologetic argument that could somehow then from that angle, taking it from that angle, sustain the traditional assumptions and narrative about the Book of Abraham, when all we have to do is actually go into the text itself and we can see the way that this was composed of separate historical traditions that contradicted each other, that were put into the Bible, that the author of the Book of Abraham, Joseph Smith, assumed from his perspective, were all just one revelation originally from Moses, now put into the lips of Abraham.

John Dehlin [00:34:18] So I know you never use these words, but the way I interpret what you just said is all the work of John Gee of trying to find true Egyptian or historical sort of a basis for the belief that the Book of Abraham is a translation of a historic ancient document is just on a bad foundation.

David Bokovoy [00:34:46] That's exactly. I would be happy to use that exact term. It is a bad foundation because the reality is we have the Book of Abraham. We can analyze the Book of Abraham, its actual content, historically, critically, and it teaches us that this is a 19th century document that someone has used the Bible to help produce.

John Dehlin [00:35:10] Right. What do you think about. And this is kind of jumping ahead a tiny bit, but tell us what the Catalyst Theory is and what you think about that.

David Bokovoy [00:35:24] Okay, so I believed in the Catalyst Theory as a, as a believing Latter Day Saint long before I had even heard what, you know, the term Catalyst Theory in Fact, I don't know that I really love that term because it. It just. It. I think it's kind of confusing. The reality is someone like John Gee or Kerry Milstein, who actually believed that Joseph Smith literally translated the Book of Abraham from an Egyptian document that existed at one point, they still believe that papyri was a catalyst for the revelation. So it can be a little bit confusing, but in essence, what apologists mean by that is that Joseph Smith did not have in his possession the actual Book of Abraham, but in his efforts to interpret and render that Egyptian papyri that he purchased from Michael Chandler, he then is inspired to produce the Book of Abraham.

John Dehlin [00:36:24] So that's so kind of like he did with the Book of Moses, somehow purchasing the papyru, having them sitting there with him wherever he was in Kirtland or whatever, having them in the room then gives him some creative prophetic juices to then channel from God a revelation much like he would have done with the Book of Moses without that same inspiration. Moses kind of begs the question, why would he need the scrolls if he could have just done it without.

David Bokovoy [00:36:57] He wouldn't have. But that's why it's very important to recognize that the evidence is clear historically that Joseph and his scribes believed that they were doing a literal translation, that they were interpreting literally those Egyptian characters, and through inspiration, receiving that directly from God, and that it was a literal translation and that therefore something that made it very, very different from the revelation that was the Book of Moses.

John Dehlin [00:37:27] So you believe that Joseph believed he was translating the papyrus?

David Bokovoy [00:37:32] Oh, yeah, yeah. The evidence is very clear. He is definitely.

John Dehlin [00:37:35] And some of that evidence is, you

David Bokovoy [00:37:38] know, the characters that he is trying to define and interpret and explain. The new Joseph Smith Papers Project that was produced by my friend Ryan Hoglid, and it's very clear to me the evidence that this is something that is, as they write down characters from the text and then try to identify with the meaning of that, that they're using that as a translation, document and source to produce the Book of Abraham. And, you know, long before Joseph Smith Papers Project, Brent Metcalf was showing that quite effectively for years.

John Dehlin [00:38:15] Okay. Because that. So a couple questions come from. That is that kind of seems to address the idea of it being a fraud or a forgery. That kind of, based on our discussion last episode, upgrades it from forgery to at least pseudepigrapha in the sense that it wasn't an intentional fraud to deceive for personal gain. Is that fair or not fair?

Book of Abraham as Prophetic Midrash

David Bokovoy [00:38:42] Yeah, I don't see any evidence that it was to deceive for personal gain. Another way that I like to define it is prophetic midrash. Midrash is a term that is, you know, there is Jewish midrash, and I'm not saying that that's what this is with a capital M. But midrash we see happening in the Bible as well. And it's, as, you know, authors tried to deal with gaps in the narrative or problems or inconsistencies. They would be very creative in producing elaborate forms of sacred text to answer those needs. And I see that Joseph Smith, you know, very much involved with that, which is, again, a venerable sacred tradition in Judaism and in early Christianity.

John Dehlin [00:39:28] So, yeah, so just kind of creatively riffing, spontaneously, spiritually prophesying and in conjunction with some existing material.

David Bokovoy [00:39:37] Sure. And Abraham, I mean, he is, you know, the father of three major world religions. I mean, you cannot get a more important.

John Dehlin [00:39:46] Christianity, Islam and Judaism and Judaism all

David Bokovoy [00:39:49] look to him as this great patriarchal figure. Whether he was a real historical figure or not, we have no evidence that he was. But regardless, he's still viewed upon as this great ancestral figure. And so what does Joseph Smith's text do? It takes that figure and makes him relevant, personally relevant for a Mormon community of believers, and then introduces doctrine about the premortal existence, the divine council of gods, all of these things that are. That Joseph is starting to come up with and that find their way in the Book of Abraham as inspired scripture.

John Dehlin [00:40:25] So we'll get to sort of some cool things about the. About the Book of Abraham in a second. But going back to this question of the mechanics and what it all means. What does it mean? What does it mean for someone who either wants to believe the Book of Abraham is valid or is scripture, or for someone who wants to say it's not? What does it mean that Joseph didn't understand what he was doing, that he thought he was translating when he actually. Because. Because the Rosetta Stone had not yet been discovered, so no one could read Egyptian at the time. So it was his. His guess was as good as anybody's, I guess. But. But at the same time, now we know, because the Rosetta Stone was discovered, that it was wrong and he wasn't. What does that mean?

David Bokovoy [00:41:14] Yeah, it's. Well, I mean, one could obviously make an argument, and I have no problem with people that say, oh, therefore, it's. It's. It's just silly. It's all, you know, really good and gobbledygook that I really have no interest In. And I have no issue with people taking that perspective. I think it's perfectly logical. But on the flip side of that, I think my perspective that I have advocated for years is also perfectly logical for a believer. And that is, does it really matter that Joseph didn't understand the revelatory process? I don't expect perfection from my friends. I don't expect it from prophets, from sacred text or Scripture. And you know, yeah, I wouldn't hold. Just because Joseph Smith misunderstood what was literally happening in the process, in my mind, does not mean that it's make the Scripture any less sacred or inspired.

John Dehlin [00:42:09] And there was a note that I took in reading your book where I have you saying something to the effect of the Book of Abraham is no less legitimate than the Old Testament. In other words, could you find, and I think you addressed this in the last episode, can you find pseudepigrapha in the Old Testament? Yeah, like. And, you know, so an example would be. You probably talked about this already, but.

David Bokovoy [00:42:33] Well, for example, like from the Old Testament, I'd say one of my favorite examples we've discussed already a bit is Deutero Isaiah. I mean, the reason that material was attached to beginning with chapter 40, that scroll of Isaiah, is because somebody was writing as if they were the 9th century BCE prophet Isaiah or from that school of thought and felt that that addition needed to take place. We see it a lot more frequently and in the, in the, what is often referred to as, you know, from a Christian perspective, the intertestamental literature, which is a loaded Christian term. But the material, like, you know, we've

David Bokovoy [00:43:18] got lots of books that have been preserved from Isaiah, from Enoch, different books of Enoch, from, you know, the Ascension of Isaiah, the Apocalypse of Abraham, all these different books that were written by Jewish authors as if they were those figures from the past. And then that obviously happens in the New Testament, as we've already discussed with Peter and Paul.

John Dehlin [00:43:38] And so. And we'll get into this with the Book of Mormon, because it's probably the biggest question about higher criticism in the Book of Mormon. You just said that Isaiah didn't write all of Isaiah.

David Bokovoy [00:43:50] Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:43:50] That the latter portions of Isaiah were actually written by somebody else, but as pseudepigrapha in Isaiah's name.

David Bokovoy [00:43:59] Yes.

John Dehlin [00:44:00] And so I guess to me, where that becomes relevant is I'm sure that there are many people that leave Mormonism and become evangelical Christians, let's just say, like Sandra Tanner or Sean McCraney or, you know, whoever. Thousands of people have done that. You can see Them discard the book of Abraham purely because it's pseudepigrapha or a book of Moses. And what I hear you saying is if you're gonna apply that standard in this direction, you would necessarily need to apply it in the other direction too. And either say you're open to Scripture being a lot more flexible and nuanced and sophisticated and imperfect in both directions, or, or you got to throw it all out. Is that an consistent.

David Bokovoy [00:44:50] Absolutely, John. In fact, you mentioned Grant Palmer in a previous discussion. And I got to know Grant a little bit after he wrote his book Insider's Guide to Mormonism. He came to a couple lectures that I gave on historical Jesus. And it was interesting to me that Grant, especially when I gave a presentation on historical Jesus, and it made Grant very uncomfortable. You know, he did not like it. And I just, and I'm not saying anything negative about Grant, who's a wonderful person, a great human being, rest in peace, and a friend I consider. But it just didn't make sense to me that here was a man who was so critical about Joseph Smith. I mean, especially as things got going. I mean, Grant, you know, Grant, I

John Dehlin [00:45:43] mean, he just double barrels, he hated Joseph Smith.

David Bokovoy [00:45:46] I mean, he just had nothing good to say about Joseph Smith whatsoever and was so critically minded about Mormon scripture and Mormon history. But then he wouldn't take that into the Bible. And that lack of consistency was always a bit confusing to me. And he's certainly not the only one that is, that takes that approach. But yeah, it's, it's, yeah, you're basically

John Dehlin [00:46:10] saying all scripture, Mormon, Christian, Jewish, Muslim, all scripture is messy. Consistence, inconsistencies, anachronisms, pseudepigrapha, you know, questionable authorship, ahistoricity.

David Bokovoy [00:46:28] And isn't that beautiful?

John Dehlin [00:46:30] Yeah, that's where your, yeah, maybe a bit refreshing to my audience or at least for some. And that's not to say you are necessarily an orthodox Christian or even a believer in God necessarily. You're just saying instead of that, condemning all scripture and making it invalidating all scripture. You're like, no, no, no, that, what do you mean it's more beautiful? What do you mean?

David Bokovoy [00:46:53] I think it's, I think it's more beautiful from my perspective to see the, the, the messiness of it all.

John Dehlin [00:47:00] To see why some would say messy, beautiful, messy by definitions, gross and ugly. Beauty is beauty. Messy is not beauty.

David Bokovoy [00:47:07] I, I, I love, I love the, I love to see human beings struggling to try to verbalize their experiences with the divine and allowing their culture Their biases. Everything come into the creation of sacred literature, even when I disagree with what the final output is in terms of morality or what it might be. And I think that's all part of the process.

David Bokovoy [00:47:38] I don't know. I'm just attracted to that idea of humans, of being okay with the lack of perfection and allowing human imprint on the creation of something sublime. To me, that makes. Doesn't make, for example, the book of Abraham any less inspirational and any less wonderful to have Joseph Smith as the author of it. I find it interesting then to jump in and see, well, and try to figure out what was going on in Kirtland, Ohio, that led him to feel like he had a desire to create this. And what is the historical context? What can that teach us about the revelatory process? What can that teach us about Joseph Smith?

David Bokovoy [00:48:18] I guess that's what I mean when I say that I like it better because I'm able to then delve into questions that I would have along those lines.

John Dehlin [00:48:29] I would imagine you'd say as well, you like the messiness of it because it's real, because it's true, because it's vulnerable. And maybe it's kind of fun and creative at times. Even if there's dark and light, it's just more human.

David Bokovoy [00:48:45] Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:48:46] And I love humans.

David Bokovoy [00:48:47] Yeah. Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:48:49] So why not love their scripture?

David Bokovoy [00:48:50] It's reflective of my own experience and I think everyone's experience. The reality is, I don't. I mean, sometimes we may think we're absolutely 100 right on track. And then years later, we look back from a different perspective angle and we thought, wow, I really blew that. Or I'd sure do things differently now. It's good to allow for growth. It's good to allow for mistakes, for human error in each other, in our religious authority figures and in our sacred text.

John Dehlin [00:49:17] There was this quote from your book that I wrote down. The book of Abraham is someone wrote that the book of Abraham is what Abraham would have written if given the chance.

David Bokovoy [00:49:29] Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:49:30] And that was. That was a little bit maddening and outrageous to me when I read it. Who said that? And what did it mean? Was that you.

David Bokovoy [00:49:35] That was me. That was me. If. If from it. But from Joseph Smith's perspective.

John Dehlin [00:49:40] Okay.

David Bokovoy [00:49:41] From Joseph's Smith perspective, this is what Abraham would have said if Abraham had. Was given a chance and he was given voice to that. From Joseph Smith's perspective, that's important to add, but.

John Dehlin [00:49:51] Yeah, but yet he didn't think he was doing pseudepigraphy.

David Bokovoy [00:49:56] He thought that on His. On his. By his own hand, upon Papa Pyri. I mean, he makes it very clear.

John Dehlin [00:50:02] And how could Joseph, just to push back a tiny bit on that. How could Joseph think he was translating when he wasn't? How could he have not known what he was doing? And I know you're. I'm the psychologist.

David Bokovoy [00:50:16] I was going to say. You are so funny. I was just going to say, John, I should ask you that. You're the psychologist. I don't know.

John Dehlin [00:50:23] No, there are people that genuinely believe they've been abducted by aliens and they genuinely believe it.

David Bokovoy [00:50:28] Yeah, absolutely.

John Dehlin [00:50:30] We know that there are people that claim to have been there when Sidney Rigdon and Brigham Young were fighting, you know, over the succession of the church

David Bokovoy [00:50:39] and watched Joseph Smith, John D. Lee and watched the Transfiguration, and they weren't even there.

John Dehlin [00:50:43] And they were. We have boat records or ship cruise line records or whatever, that they were in England at the time. Like, the human mind has incredible power.

David Bokovoy [00:50:52] Absolutely.

John Dehlin [00:50:53] To, to make you believe all sorts of things.

David Bokovoy [00:50:56] Absolutely.

John Dehlin [00:50:56] Why would that not be true of Joseph Smith?

David Bokovoy [00:50:59] Absolutely. And he, I mean, it just. I'm not, I'm not going to suggest that there weren't ever times in Joseph Smith's life where he thought, oh, if I produce this, this will help me get a following, this will help me get money, or this will be. Obviously he would complicated individual like all of us. And I'm sure those, those were drives that, that he dealt with. But at the same time, I think overall there's just, you know, he absolutely believed that what he was doing was the right thing and the call of God. I mean, Dan Vogel points out Section 19 of the Doctrine and Covenants where God in Joseph Smith's Revelation states, you know, let me tell you the truth, I'll paraphrase it here.

Joseph Smith's Theological Innovations

David Bokovoy [00:51:45] Right. Just for fun. But it's. Let me tell you the truth. There's really no such thing as eternal punishment and there's really no such thing as eternal damnation. Nevertheless, I allow people to use that to scare the hell out of people because it works for their good. It works for the good of the saints and in the hearts of men to think in those terms. So Dan Vogel points that out, you know, and he says, look, this is Joseph Smith's view of God, that God is in essence, a pious fraud. So why would we think that Joseph Smith wouldn't feel justified in doing that on occasion if, if, if he felt God did that?

David Bokovoy [00:52:19] I think it's a very, it's an extremely valid point and I, you know, I, I'm sure that was an element there to it. But at the, in the end, I also see Joseph Smith as sincere believer. I don't think he could do what he did and accomplish what he accomplished. And as I study and I read his writings and his revelations and you know, and I, I've read everything, I've read through all of Vogel's early Mormon documents here. I've read through about every resource that I have. And I, I see a man who was complex and on a, and was overall speaking absolutely a true believer, that he was called of God to do what he did.

John Dehlin [00:52:59] That's, that's fascinating. Tell us really quickly who Robert Rittner is and what his role in all this is.

Egyptologists Weigh In on the Book of Abraham

David Bokovoy [00:53:04] Okay, so Robert Rittner is an Egyptologist. John Gee, the LDS Egyptologist who works UCLA.

John Dehlin [00:53:11] What was his Ph.D. yale. Yeah, yeah, that's right. Not, not a shoddy school.

David Bokovoy [00:53:16] No, not at all. And Robert Rittner.

John Dehlin [00:53:19] And wait, really quick. How do you explain John Gee? How do you explain you've, you've known these people, you've interacted with them. How do you explain a Yale PhD Egyptologist who would go to such lengths to try and explain kind of the unexplainable to. I think you line up 100 non Mormon people, you kind of tell them the story, you lay out the evidence.

John Dehlin [00:53:46] I think 100 or 99 out of 100, if not 100, are all going to kind of arrive at the similar kind of conclusion about how this all happened. Now, maybe I'm overstating it, but I don't think I'm overstating that too much. Here you have a Yale trained PhD Egyptologist that's going to dedicate his life and reputation to defending the indefensible, to defending kind of objective untruth or a position that is falsifiable from many, many different angles. Help us. And I'm not asking you to speak for John Guy and I'm not asking you to be critical of him because I know you wouldn't be anyway. But how does that phenomenon of a John G. Happen? Well, I, if you had to explain

David Bokovoy [00:54:33] it, you know, I mean, I'm, I'm similar in the sense. I mean, I, the reason I did historical critical biblical scholarship is because I believed with all my heart might mind and soul in the Bible and Joseph Smith's work. And I felt called of God to pursue that education so that I could bring that back and, and help the church.

David Bokovoy [00:55:02] Yeah, there weren't, I mean, for, you know, There weren't. There are very few people in Latter Day Saint, the history of Latter Day Saint movements who've had critical training in Bible scholarship. And that is something that I was interested in. I felt the doors opened somewhat miraculously for me to do as a father of four small children. And I felt.

David Bokovoy [00:55:25] Felt driven, absolutely driven to provide, to use my scholarship to help build the kingdom. And that's how I see John Gee and Carrie Mealstein as well, even though I disagree with them, obviously, in their scholarship and what they're doing.

David Bokovoy [00:55:39] So I would just explain it that way. And when you are that driven, it's, you know, it's. You feel called. And I, I'm assuming that that's similar to their feelings of it on the matter. You know, Carrie Meelstein just wrote a. Another Mormon Egyptologist at byu, just wrote an article for the Insign that just came out recently, you know, a couple weeks ago. And in it he opens up, basically, the first paragraph says that, you know, that all that really matters is revelation when it comes to assessing the Book of Abraham.

David Bokovoy [00:56:13] And that's a pivot, right? Yeah. Well, the thing that frustrates me about that is then, then why are we advertising that you're an Egyptologist? If that's all that matters, why does your training matter?

John Dehlin [00:56:24] I could say that, you know, why does it.

David Bokovoy [00:56:26] Why does it matter? Or, you know, and then before that, at a couple years ago at a fair presentation, Kerry did the same thing. He kind of came out and he began the presentation saying something along the lines that whenever I find new information, I immediately make it fit into my religious convictions about the Book of Abraham. So I analyze all the material from that perspective, and the truth is, is I don't have any issue with that, John. That would never work for me. Ever work for me. But if it works for other people, that's fine. That is absolutely fine. But then why are we pretending that a degree in Egyptology matters?

David Bokovoy [00:57:05] Why are we pretending that scholarship matters on some level? And, and that's. Scholarship can sustain our religious assumptions when in reality all that really matters is revelation. To me, we have to be consistent. So either, say, revelation is all that really matters and so we don't really care about scholarship, or then be consistent, say, yeah, we actually value scholarship. So let's take the whole of it into perspective and not pick and choose the parts that will sustain our traditional religious narratives. And that's my big issue with what I see in Book of Abraham apologetics and what frustrates me.

John Dehlin [00:57:39] Yeah. Because the Q15 could just short circuit apologetics and say Book of Moses, Book of Abraham, New Testament, Old Testament, Book of Mormon. It's all revelation, period. Sure, that's it. Who cares about the mechanics and how it happened? Gift and power of God, revelation. Let's move on. Yeah, you don't need a department. You don't need the Maxwell Institute or FARMS or fair of Mormon and annual fair conferences and a huge fair Mormon website with all these tomes and tomes of explanations and all these debates. If in reality it really comes down to just revelation.

David Bokovoy [00:58:12] Yeah, and I think that's the way that it, it should go. Because as it stands right now, by doing poor scholarship and just picking and choosing and acting as if it's a big deal that this insight article has been written by a professionally trained Egyptologist. But then really coming down to it doesn't really matter. All that matters is Revelation. You know, that's, that's inconsistent and I think we should, that that's why it's unhealthy right now and why I think so many believing Mormons who start to learn and delve about these things and delve into these waters, all of a sudden they feel deceived. And that's not good.

John Dehlin [00:58:49] Yeah, that's not good. Okay, so I'm going to scratch the surface a tiny bit more because there was David Bacavoy as a believer who was still holding a more realistic, sophisticated view of the Book of Abraham. So what's the difference between a John Gee and a believing David Bachavoy who was willing to kind of describe reality versus sort of deny reality? Because both of those dudes were believers, right?

David Bokovoy [00:59:20] Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:59:22] What was it that allowed you to sort of go with the, with the Catalyst Theory? Whereas Guy wouldn't. What would make a Guy reject the Catalyst Theory in the way that we generally think about the Catalyst Theory?

David Bokovoy [00:59:37] Because they, I would say, do not have training and they don't have training in historical criticism. And I'm not suggesting that they're not smart, they're not intelligent, they're not brilliant.

John Dehlin [00:59:49] They are Yale PhD, that's all you gotta say.

David Bokovoy [00:59:52] These are brilliant men and they have wonderful training in their respective fields. But in the end, they're not Bible scholars. And it's through reading the Bible critically and looking at it seriously that that shifted my viewpoint of Scripture and where I was much more open than to take a non traditional view of it that I wouldn't have been able to do. And I think, and it goes back to, you know, I'm not saying anything about John Or Carrie, I don't know their stories well enough, but if you'll go, we go back and remember, I was told by a BYU religion professor, don't do Bible, do Egyptology, do Assyriology, do comparative Semitics, do anything but Bible.

David Bokovoy [01:00:34] And this is not unique to Mormonism. Evangelical conservative Christians groups have done this for decades. They'll send their personnel to Yale, to Brandeis, to Harvard, to, you know, Berkeley, to these great programs, but they won't actually do Bible. They'll do like a history of Bible scholarship, or they'll do Egyptology, and then they return to, back to their respective faith communities as experts in Bible because they have this peripheral expertise and training, and they've never had to engage the actual scripture critically and carefully. And that's really fundamentally what makes the difference. And it's why, you know, not that I ever had the all the answers or pretended to have them, but it's what I wanted to do for church education, is to say, look, this isn't going anywhere.

David Bokovoy [01:01:26] It's. It's all out there. It's now. We live in a world of information accessibility. Let me help. Let me just help and offer this gift to my community, to my church that I love so dearly and help them help you say, it's okay, we can still go forward, we can move as a people. Not that these are all the right answers, but there are ways of making this work. But it's just at least professionally, didn't work for me as much as I tried to.

John Dehlin [01:01:58] I'm trying to imagine four or five years at a PhD program studying the Bible, but walling yourself off from, from all the tools and all the full, robust, you know, understandings of that discipline. How do you survive four or five years? Not really digging into historical criticism. Historical criticism. Getting a PhD in biblical studies like I, I would. I think that deserves its own book on how somebody would find a way to kind of avoid learning or thinking about the prevail. It's almost like a biologist trying to do biology, never accepting of evolution as a foundation. Right?

David Bokovoy [01:02:43] Yeah.

John Dehlin [01:02:44] It would be like an adventure in absurdity almost.

David Bokovoy [01:02:47] And that's why these people from different faith groups will do Egyptology or do these other feels because they want to delve into the topic, but they don't want to have to have their traditional paradigms, religious paradigms, deconstructed. And they know that their viewpoints of Mosaic authorship or whatever it might be that they cling to would never be accepted by the academic community. So they avoid it and then return to their, as scholars.

John Dehlin [01:03:16] And then it's just hard to imagine how their conscience doesn't sort of prick through and say, you know, some, some warning lights going off saying you're denying something that everybody believes and understands within this discipline. You're avoiding it. At some point you'd think they would go, wow, I kind of am doing something that is on a shaky foundation, but somehow they just kind of barrel forward and spend decades in the same pursuit. Right.

David Bokovoy [01:03:45] Well, if. And if your religious convictions are so deep and entrenched. Yeah, makes sense.

John Dehlin [01:03:53] Yeah.

David Bokovoy [01:03:54] I just, I had, I went down the second I made that decision to say, okay, I appreciate the advice, but I want to do Bible. And I won't buy any of these things, but I want to understand it. The second I made that choice, it was game over. Yeah, my name, well, my life would never be the same same. And they were, you know, I, I don't look back at those, at that advice I was given by those BYU professors and think, oh, how unsophisticated or naive. I mean, they were, right? I mean, the reality, look what happened to me at BYU and church education.

David Bokovoy [01:04:27] I was always deemed as someone who was a threat, someone to be concerned about, someone who was, we better watch, because we don't know what's going to happen with him. And that was a hard position for them to be in, and it was certainly hard for me and my family.

John Dehlin [01:04:45] And it's just, it's super problematic. And Bill Real, in his recent disciplinary council, just is pounding on this idea that it's disconcerting when a religion that claims to be, you know, run by God and Jesus Christ himself is willing to throw the truth under the bus for convenience and is unwilling to face the realities of truth. I mean, I, you know, my favorite hymn was, oh, say what is Truth? You know, as a Mormon, truth always mattered to me. And it's, it's weird when this church, that so many people put their full trust and confidence and build their lives upon it when they're almost at sometimes allergic or hostile to truth.

David Bokovoy [01:05:31] Yeah, I see a little differently in the sense, I think these are sincere for the most part, sincere men who, you know, whether talking local priesthood leaders or all the way up, who, when they're exposed to things like this, think, okay, we don't have an answer, but there'll be an answer somewhere down the road that will make sense. So in the meantime, let's not allow this to distract what we're supposed to do. And those who are calling for, hey, let's get answers to this historical issue, or let's address this matter of scholarship. When they feel that the Lord hasn't spoken on the matter, you know, that concerns them. They feel threatened by it and want to. Want to protect the institution, want to protect the general church members. So I. I get it. I. I get where they're coming from, and I. I appreciate that.

John Dehlin [01:06:30] I.

David Bokovoy [01:06:30] That it comes from a place of sincerity. It's just. I just feel like. It's just. I'm just a little bit different. I'm wired.

John Dehlin [01:06:39] Just to be clear, I'm not saying they're bad people.

David Bokovoy [01:06:41] Yeah.

John Dehlin [01:06:42] And I'm not saying they're intentionally defrauding or misleading people.

David Bokovoy [01:06:46] Yeah.

John Dehlin [01:06:47] But I'm. But I am saying that there is aversion to truth. There is. There is an aversion to truth that doesn't fit the narrative.

David Bokovoy [01:06:55] Yeah.

John Dehlin [01:06:56] You know, that doesn't fit the narrative that. The popular narrative or the convenient narrative. And then there's a willingness to punish people that are advocating what we would all agree to is true. That comes at a high human cost.

David Bokovoy [01:07:13] Yeah.

John Dehlin [01:07:14] And I'm not saying they're bad people or the church is bad, but I'm. I think that's. That's kind of evident.

David Bokovoy [01:07:20] Yeah.

John Dehlin [01:07:20] From. From Juanita Brooks to Fawn Brody to L. Bennion to Eugene, England. David Wright.

David Bokovoy [01:07:28] Yeah.

John Dehlin [01:07:28] September 6th. Michael Quinn.

David Bokovoy [01:07:30] Even in my life, even though I haven't been disciplined, and I don't ever see that happening, but I. But it just. It was hard to be in church education and to try and. And to try and help along these lines when that help wasn't wanted.

John Dehlin [01:07:46] Yeah.

David Bokovoy [01:07:48] That was hard.

John Dehlin [01:07:49] Super hard. Yeah.

David Bokovoy [01:07:51] And I don't blame them. I blame myself.

John Dehlin [01:07:54] You know, I don't know about that. What do you mean?

David Bokovoy [01:07:57] Well, I blame myself in the sense that. Not that I feel like I did something wrong, but, I mean, I'm the one that chose to study what I studied. I'm the one who said I want to help the church. The church never asked me to do any of those things. It's not their fault. It's. You know that. It's just I. They were my choices. I own them. I accept them, and I'm grateful I made them. But from that perspective, I'm to blame. Does that make. Did I.

John Dehlin [01:08:22] It does. I remember an interview I did with Albert Peck. Albert Peck, one of the early editors of Sunstone magazine. And if I'm remembering the story right, Gordon B. Hinckley calls him in, and this is when Sunstone was becoming really controversial and Gordon Hinkley says to Albert Peck, who called you to this. In other words, you think you're helping us. We didn't ask for this help. Exactly, exactly.

David Bokovoy [01:08:54] I felt that it was needed and that God wanted me to do it. And I still do.

John Dehlin [01:09:02] It's so sweet. It's so sweet that you had that impulse and it's so sacred.

David Bokovoy [01:09:09] Yeah, yeah. I, I, yeah.

John Dehlin [01:09:11] But then it, it, in some ways it ended in a violent way. And I don't mean physically violent, but kind of emotionally and spiritually.

David Bokovoy [01:09:18] It was hard. It was hard the whole the deal. But it, you know, you and I have talked about this before off, off the air. But I just. You cannot really go in. You cannot try to just coast. You just want to coast through life. It's going to be easy and you won't run into too many challenges or problems. But if you want to really push to try to help people, to help institutions, to make a change in the world to do things, you're going to get beat up along the way. That's just part of that. Just goes with the territory. You have to accept that. Otherwise just coast. And I'm not a coaster. And either you. And that's, you know, that's part of the process.

John Dehlin [01:09:57] Amen, brother. I can relate a little bit to that. Yeah. All right, back to Robert Ridner, who's Robert Ritter. Really quick.

David Bokovoy [01:10:03] Okay, so Robert Rittner. I can't remember where he. I'm not an Egyptologist.

John Dehlin [01:10:07] Chicago.

David Bokovoy [01:10:08] Is he? Oh, he's at Chicago now. That's right. Yep. He is at Chicago now. At least last I heard he was at Yale when John Geese studied with him and he developed an interest. I don't know if it was through John or he already had that of in the Book of Abraham and so started publishing. He wrote for the Journal of Near Eastern Studies on the Book of Abraham, the Elliot Book of Abraham, showing why it was not ancient and authentic. And and then did most his most recent publication was with signature book where he goes through and you know, really critiques Nibley Criti critiques John. He especially John G. In the footnotes Carrie Milstein. And there's their scholarship and you know, shows the human influence that is found in the, in the Book of Abraham.

John Dehlin [01:10:54] Is he applying historical criticism? Absolutely. Okay. Okay.

David Bokovoy [01:10:57] Yeah. From an Egyptological perspective, not from a biblical perspective. There are a couple of biblical scholars that write in the introduction on the or of the Chaldees and some of those issues that are topic. But he's an Egyptologist. But yeah. And a Great one.

John Dehlin [01:11:11] So, so he's kind of like Michael Coe is to Book of Mormon archaeology what Robert Rittner is to the Book of Abraham. Kind of a non Mormon scholar that cared enough to dig in. And then the comment on Modern apologetics in that realm and he kind of tears Guy and Milstein apart, I guess, or their arguments.

David Bokovoy [01:11:33] Certainly in the footnotes. It gets pretty volatile, too volatile for my taste. Even though I, I, I don't know Robert Rittner personally. I've had some email exchanges with him and he's an excellent scholar, one of the best. And his publications, especially in the Book of Abraham, need to be taken seriously. I had a lot more written, I'll just admit this. I had a lot more written or cited in my book authoring the Old Testament. And my editor was like, well, don't

John Dehlin [01:12:02] know the teacher books. You don't know that you need Lloyd, or we call him Lloyd Lloyd.

David Bokovoy [01:12:07] He was, he was like, you know what? He's like. All this is going to do is upset people that are really traditionally minded that you're relying so heavily on this very critical scholar. Let's take this out. And, and Lloyd was right because there was no need for me to just rehash stuff that he had already written, but you know, to put it into the context of that book. So good, good move, Lloyd.

John Dehlin [01:12:27] Lloyd's going to give you grief about, about the, that the book is the Joseph Smith Egyptian Papyri, a complete edition By Robert Rittner, Ph.D. and that's the signature books book that you mentioned. Excellent. So we'll put that maybe in the show notes.

David Bokovoy [01:12:44] Yeah, absolutely.

John Dehlin [01:12:47] That's worth mentioning. Okay, so I guess let's conclude by just what we did before. Tell us a couple beautiful things about the Book of Abraham that would, that would give a questioning or doubting or even post Mormon reason to not completely discard the book. Do you have a couple things and you referenced a few things earlier.

What Endures in the Book of Abraham

David Bokovoy [01:13:06] Yeah, yeah. I think the construct of human premortal existence that comes out of there and you know, is just a beautiful way of looking at our lives and the structuring of the universe. I think it's fascinating to see Joseph Smith's presentation of, of gods in the plural, especially in the creation and narrative, as he reworks the priestly narrative to God's creating in reflection of his evolving theology at that time period, to see the way that Joseph Smith is incorporating his study of Hebrew. The book of Abraham is the way that it is because Joseph Smith was studying Hebrew at the time and we can document those historical influences in the creation of the narrative. And I, I think that's beautiful to uncover and to see.

John Dehlin [01:13:54] Excellent. Somebody asks. There's a couple questions from our listeners. One was it was around the statement of the book of Abraham being what. What Abraham would have written if he could have. The reader writes. That sort of logic or justification makes my head spin. I know I'm not a biblical scholar and this is my first fray into higher criticism, but it leaves me scratching my head and wondering whether you really believe this or if that's just spin you had to take to keep your job with the church. Now, what I heard you say was that you believe that's what Joseph Smith believed.

David Bokovoy [01:14:29] Yes.

John Dehlin [01:14:30] That's not what you believe. I don't mean to answer for you,

David Bokovoy [01:14:32] but no, no, no. I don't know if Abraham, if Abraham was a real person.

John Dehlin [01:14:40] That's the first question.

David Bokovoy [01:14:41] Yeah, I mean, I astound. There's no evidence that he was. I mean all we have is the Bible and that comes so many centuries later and is so anachronistic and so mythological in all of it to use that to say, okay, he's real.

David Bokovoy [01:14:57] And I don't know that historians can say one way or the other based upon that. So if you believe that Abraham was a real historical figure, that is a, that's a matter of faith. That's a religious theological assumption and just own it. Own it. I believe this because that's my religious conviction. I know there's no evidence, but I just, I believe it and just own it from. That's what I would encourage people to do.

David Bokovoy [01:15:22] So what I'm saying is not that the book of Abraham is what Abraham would have written if he had was given a chance because I don't even know if there really was such a figure in the real world. It's Joseph Smith giving voice to that. From Joseph Smith's perspective, this is what Abraham would have shared if he was given a chance.

John Dehlin [01:15:42] Yeah.

David Bokovoy [01:15:43] It's different.

John Dehlin [01:15:43] Yeah. Yeah.

David Bokovoy [01:15:44] And hopefully not too complicated to understand. I know it's. I think when people say it leaves me scratching my head and stuff like that, it's because, and I don't mean to be dismissive of where anyone is at in this faith journey, but I think it's a reflection of the fact that we as Latter Day Saints have been taught to think in this binary worldview that it's the Book of Mormon, Book of Abraham. It's either all true or it's all false. And you know, it's. It's hard to shift out of that perspective if that's been your mindset for 30, 40 years, that you've been raised with. So I'm not speaking critically of anyone. I just, I understand why you. It would be hard, but there is another way of logically looking at these things if you step outside of that box.

Final Questions on the Book of Abraham

John Dehlin [01:16:30] One, one final question about Book of Abraham from listeners, and I don't know if you even know, but do you believe that the Egyptian grammar book is the work of Phelps or do you believe Joseph came up with the translations of the Egyptian characters found on the Horus scroll?

David Bokovoy [01:16:45] I think it's primarily Joseph Smith, but I do believe that, you know, he was taking Phelps's and others imprint and that was no doubt captured. I think all of these men were familiar with Abrahamic lore and tradition. That was found in Adam Clark's commentary, that was found in Messianic rituals, that was found in Josephus, was found in all of these sources, and they were very well read and they were able to take that information and bring it into the context of a project that Joseph Smith himself self oversaw. There's no doubt in my mind that that's what took place.

John Dehlin [01:17:23] Okay. Okay. Well, let's jump to. The Book of Mormon, as you know, is probably, you know, Gordon B. Hinckley threw down the gauntlet and basically said, or was it Ashtav Benson, that the Book of Mormon is the keystone of our religion. The whole church in its validity rides on the truthfulness or the falseness of the Book of Mormon. It's either exactly what it claims to be or is the biggest fraud ever perpetrated on mankind. I'm sure I'm paraphrasing, but, but that's about.

David Bokovoy [01:17:54] Right, Right.

John Dehlin [01:17:56] So what is, what does historical criticism or higher criticism tell us about.

David Bokovoy [01:18:00] I wish we could get away from that mindset. I really do.

John Dehlin [01:18:03] Well, you're helping us.

David Bokovoy [01:18:05] I wish we could get away from that and, and, and, and not be so black and white in the way that we see any of this material and the way that we use it. I think it presents problems, obviously,

John Dehlin [01:18:21] you

David Bokovoy [01:18:21] know, and I wish we could get away from the way that we've used as a church, the Book of Mormon. Seems to me that we've used the Book of Mormon, which, as I've discussed at length, I think is one of the most inspired books ever. I just, Its message is so powerful, so necessary for our world right now.

David Bokovoy [01:18:41] But instead of like thinking about the messages that you have, like in King Benjamin's sermon about wealth and how we handle that thinking about Jesus's visitation as a, as a story about overcoming tribalism and becoming one unified people, instead of realizing that the only people that are really successful at saving and changing people's hearts and minds are the anti nephi, Lehi, the pacifist. They're the only ones that really work.

David Bokovoy [01:19:06] Instead of recognizing the problems that racism presents for the authorial voices in the, in the Book of Mormon, how it leads to the eradication of the entire civilization, all of these messages that are really important for today's world. Right?

David Bokovoy [01:19:20] We don't use it that way. I wish we would, but we don't really use it that way. Instead, we take it and we go door to door and we tell people, all right, read the. You don't have to read this book. Just read this part of Third Nephi, read this part of Second Nephi, or read. Ever read these little sections, Pray, ask God if it's true. And when you feel the Holy Ghost, when you feel good, you will know it's true. And if you know it's true, then Joseph Smith is a true prophet. If Joseph Smith is a true prophet, then President Nelson is a true prophet living today.

John Dehlin [01:19:50] And then follow the modern prophets and

David Bokovoy [01:19:52] whatever they're saying the way. And so I wish we, we. I wish we would look at and use the Book of Mormon for its message. It's a little bit more. Instead of using it as a tool to get people to, you know, church authority and leadership and be in obedience. Instead, I just wish we would look at it and appreciate this incredible scriptural text that is produced by Joseph Smith and given to the world as this incredible gift. And I believe that's what I believe it is. So nonetheless, in terms of historical analysis, the same type of challenges that we see in the Book of Abraham, the book of Moses,

John Dehlin [01:20:34] after that lovely positive

David Bokovoy [01:20:36] disclaimer in terms of historical criticism, it's going to put the book in the 19th century and we're going to have a perfect explanation historically for how Joseph Smith creates this.

John Dehlin [01:20:48] And what are the big problems?

David Bokovoy [01:20:50] The biggest problem, the biggest problem from my perspective is without question the deutero Isaiah material that we linked to.

John Dehlin [01:20:59] So remind us what that means. So we talked about multiple authors of Isaiah.

David Bokovoy [01:21:03] So chapters one through 39, more or less, of Isaiah, the book are kind of linked in with first Isaiah, a Hebrew prophet living in Jerusalem during the 9th century BCE. Now which century? 9th, 9th.

John Dehlin [01:21:24] That would have been three centuries before Lehi.

David Bokovoy [01:21:26] Yeah.

John Dehlin [01:21:26] Allegedly leaves Jerusalem.

David Bokovoy [01:21:28] Okay, so, so, so the Isaiah material. Now I. Isaiah 1 is an exception to this Isaiah's. You know, there's, there's some, some blocks that are clearly not written by the historical Isaiah, but for the most part you can think of it in terms of, of the actual Isaiah, with a few exceptions. But chapter 40, the message changes dramatically from Call my people to repentance. Call my people to repentance to chapter 40. Comfort ye, comfort ye, my people, saith your God. And then all of the beautiful messages of comfort and restoration come back to Jerusalem and have this unification with God is the overall theme. So it's a shift in transition.

David Bokovoy [01:22:16] And scholars are convinced that the material from 40 through 66 was written much later during the exile when the Jews were in captivity, after 586, when, you know, lot, you know, a few years after Lehi left Jerusalem and even into the post exilic time period shortly thereafter. The problem is, is that that material appears in the Book of Mormon.

John Dehlin [01:22:42] Okay, really quick, before we jump into that, what are a few evidences and acronyms, whatever it is, that would substantiate that this latter portion of Isaiah, deutero Isaiah as it's called, would have been written much later. Are there evidences of that? Because theoretically Isaiah could just kind of have a change of heart or, or receive new revelation and all of a sudden be talking about grace or mercy when it was justice before or whatever

David Bokovoy [01:23:08] the difference is, it's not just. Yeah, it's very good. And I lay out all the major pieces of evidence in those two blog posts, but just to hit them, just to hit them briefly. The Hebrew is very late and it has Aramaic influence that these authors were in. That shows that they were influenced in the, in their language by the Babylonians who were using Aramaic as an administrative language to, you know, to govern their empire. That's a big one. The fact that it mentions Cyrus by name, the Persian leader, Cyrus the Great, who will overcome Babylon and then send the Jews back home. Cyrus is the only figure that's called the Messiah in the entire Hebrew Bible, ironically enough.

David Bokovoy [01:24:00] So there are these sorts of. Of pieces of evidence that would have lived later. Yeah, that it shows clear inaccuracy. The text shows a detailed understanding of Jewish life during the exile and thereafter. That that would be beyond the abilities of someone to identify unless you would they were supernatural.

John Dehlin [01:24:25] Now, I guess someone could say, well, it is a prophet, so they could have prophesied.

David Bokovoy [01:24:27] That's. And that's typically what people will say.

John Dehlin [01:24:30] But you're not.

David Bokovoy [01:24:31] That's not your point of view. Not. But if, then if that's all there was. I guess people would say, oh, well, yeah, I can just chalk it up to faith. But again, there's the Aramaic influences of the language that we're able to date that help us understand that. It's the fact that for, for example, that as I talk about in those blog posts, if this material all existed, why didn't Jeremiah quote it? Why didn't Jeremiah quote this? When people were saying, you're crazy, Jerusalem will never be destroyed, why didn't he just say, oh, yeah, well, look what Isaiah said. We will be destroyed, but we'll be brought back.

David Bokovoy [01:25:05] Why didn't he quote that? He never did. But why does Isaiah, the second half of Isaiah, why does that quote from Jeremiah? See what I'm saying? Why does that, that part of Isaiah, why does it quote from the psalms that were written later during this time period? So you start to add up layer upon layer upon layer. And there's not a single biblical scholar that I know of who fails to recognize this truth, that this material was written after Lehi and his family left Jerusalem, yet it appears in the Book of Mormon. And it.

Historical Criticism and the Book of Mormon

John Dehlin [01:25:37] And so just to connect the dots, so a Book of Mormon reader would remember the story of Nephi being sent back to Jerusalem to chop off Laban's head to get the brass plates. Because on the brass plates was the Old Testament, you know, whatever. As much of the Old Testament had been written up until that point, because that was needed so that the Nephites could stay righteous as they're traveling and use that to govern their religiosity. Is that okay to say?

David Bokovoy [01:26:07] Yeah.

John Dehlin [01:26:08] So now, really quickly, would there have been plates, brass plates? Like, how much does even that make sense before we jump to what appears in the Book of Mormon?

David Bokovoy [01:26:18] Well, it could have been brass plates, but brass plates with all of the scriptural material compiled together and translated into Egyptian.

John Dehlin [01:26:27] Reformed. Reformed? Well, we don't know. Do we know?

David Bokovoy [01:26:31] Well, reformed is usually interpreted as just an adjective meaning an altered, changed form of it that was conducive to their writing. But to translate it.

John Dehlin [01:26:38] And where does it say the brass praise? The brass plates were written in Egyptian, whereas various locations. Okay, okay.

David Bokovoy [01:26:45] Throughout it's. And they needed. They needed to have that with them so that they wouldn't forget their scriptures and their origins and stuff like that. Okay, but it's all.

John Dehlin [01:26:53] But there would not have been brass

David Bokovoy [01:26:55] plates written in Egyptian with all that material translated. That's hard for me to understand how that could happen now. It would be somewhat easier. It still would be like, yeah, I don't see it. If it had been, like, in Acadian, the language of ancient Babylon and Assyria, because they were the ones that controlled them. Egypt is kind of out of the way at this point, but even then, I'm just saying at least you could, like, say, well, Akkadian was kind of big, but in Egyptian. That doesn't make sense to me as a historian.

John Dehlin [01:27:22] And also, it's just making it sound like Laban had his own version of the quad.

David Bokovoy [01:27:26] Yeah.

John Dehlin [01:27:27] And is that. Were Jews in 600 BC running around with the Old Testament quad, Of all the books compiled together, how would it have more scrolls?

David Bokovoy [01:27:36] Yeah, scrolls that. In individual scrolls and sacred scrolls that would have been kept by scroll scribes,

John Dehlin [01:27:40] the rabbis or scribes would not have had.

David Bokovoy [01:27:42] Yeah, the general population would not have had access to such things.

John Dehlin [01:27:45] Okay.

David Bokovoy [01:27:46] But I can. Let's illustrate it this way, John. One of the most beautiful parts of that deutero Isaiah, from my perspective, is in Isaiah 52, verse 1, where this is God speaking to the Jewish community now in exile in Babylon. And we read the words, awake, awake. Put on thy strength, O Zion. Put on thy beautiful garments, O Jerusalem, the holy city. For henceforth there shall no more come into thee the uncircumcised and the unclean. Shake thyself from the death, the dust. Arise, sit down, O Jerusalem.

David Bokovoy [01:28:19] Arise, sit down, oh Jerusalem. Well, Old Testament theologian Walter Brueggeman in the 1970s wrote a wonderful article where he illustrated that what was happening here is when someone is called to get up out of the dust, it's a movement from kingship. Sorry, out of. From humanity to a position of kingship. God takes humans from the dust and then makes them king and royal and queen. And so this idea of get out of the dust, the city's been destroyed. Get out of the dust, arise and sit down. It doesn't tell you what to sit down, but when you understand the motif, he means sit down on a throne.

David Bokovoy [01:28:59] And it's actually a reversal that happens earlier in Isaiah, back in chapter 47, where the call is given, come down and sit in the dust. O virgin daughter of Babylon, sit on the ground. This is verse one. There is no throne for you. So Babylon is the great power of the time period. Babylon is told to get off the throne and go sit in the dust, be in a position of obscurity. Jerusalem's been destroyed by Babylon and is literally in the dust, told to get out of the dust. And you are going to go sit on a throne and be this Great influence for good in the world.

David Bokovoy [01:29:33] It's a beautiful section. But these are all written then to the exilic community of Jews who were now in exile was composed during that time period. And yet the Book of Mormon relies heavily upon that little section right there from start to finish, just to illustrate it quickly. In second Nephi chapter one, when Lehi speaks to his sons, he uses that verse, awake, awake, my sons, get up, rise from the dust, be men, shake off the. The vines, the bounds that are. And come out of obscurity. He uses all of this. So he's literally, from this perspective, he's drawing upon Isaiah 52, this section here, here, to create his final sermon that he gives to his sons before he dies.

David Bokovoy [01:30:23] And then a few chap. Then after that, of course, Lehi dies and the sons split up and they go their separate ways. And you have the formation of the new Nephite nation. Well, Lehi, sorry, Nephi then commands Jacob, his brother, to give the first Nephite sermon. And what does he assign him? Isaiah 52. So he quotes from Isaiah 52 and expounds it so literally. Then Jacob is asked to give an exposition on the final sermon that his dad gave. And what this shows thematically is a continuation from his final sermon from Lehi's final sermon to the prophetic continuation of the line of authority, now specifically with the Nephite nation.

David Bokovoy [01:31:09] That's. That connection is very profound and powerful. Then when Jesus comes and visits with the people, what does he do? He opens up a lot of scriptures and he spends a lot of time on Isaiah 52, arise from the dust and come forward and be this great nation, be this great people. Then when Moroni tries to conclude the Book of Mormon, he has all these false endings. Remember that? He's like trying to figure out how to get this. This ending correct. And he finally gets to the end. And how does the Book of Mormon then conclude? The Book of Mormon concludes finally when he gets it in chapter 10, where that famous promise is issued.

John Dehlin [01:31:44] Moroni 10.

David Bokovoy [01:31:45] Yeah, if you get to that very end, what does he finally do? Moroni 10, verse 31. Awake, arise from the dust, O Jerusalem. Yea, put on thy beautiful garments, O daughter of Zion, and strengthen thy stakes, and enlarge thy borders, and come unto Christ and all these things. So this one passage from Isaiah, if we walk through the end of Lehi's life, the beginning of the Nephite civilization and their people, then a movement to Jesus when he visits, and he uses this then to the conclusion of the Book of Mormon. It frames the entire Book of Mormon. So it really becomes a symbol in my mind for what the Book of Mormon is.

David Bokovoy [01:32:27] Book of Mormon is a book that claims to arise from the dust, literally come out of the ground that is then helping humanity rise to a higher position of royalty through the messages and inspiration that's found therein. Get up there and get out of the dust and become royal, become kings and queens and. And rule with power and. And goodness and kindness and. And all the great things. So it's this beautiful structure to the Book of Mormon that's witnessed, but the problem is it's all from Deutero Isaiah,

John Dehlin [01:33:01] so it's from stuff written after Lehi.

David Bokovoy [01:33:05] So it's why. Right. Illustrate that is it wouldn't have made

John Dehlin [01:33:07] the brass plates if they had even existed.

David Bokovoy [01:33:10] Yeah.

John Dehlin [01:33:10] So it couldn't have been quoted.

David Bokovoy [01:33:12] So what I want to show is, on the one hand, it's beautiful what it's incorporating, the way it's using it. It's consistent, it's powerful. We see this thing. Theme happening that is incredible to behold, but at the same time, from a pure historical perspective, from start to middle to finish, the Book of Mormon is structured around material that it. It, you know, that Joseph Smith believes would have existed and would have been accessible to them, but that would literally not have been in any form.

John Dehlin [01:33:41] Okay, now, so that's a big problem.

David Bokovoy [01:33:45] Yeah, historically, but not theologically.

John Dehlin [01:33:48] Right, but. But historically it is.

David Bokovoy [01:33:50] Yeah.

John Dehlin [01:33:51] It questions the historicity of the Book of Mormon, you know, differently from horses and.

David Bokovoy [01:33:56] Yeah.

John Dehlin [01:33:56] And steel and steel swords and all that stuff. It's just a textual. Is it an anachronism? Is that what you'd call it?

David Bokovoy [01:34:05] Absolutely. And I chose that one because I love it. I love that one. And I. The way I tried to lay that out is to show how beautiful the Book of Mormon is, is incorporating it. But literally, we could go through every single sermon and find references to the Book of Malachi, references to the New Testament, representations of sources accessible to Joseph Smith that he knew very well, he knew inside and out that were part of his cultural milieu, but that were not part of the milieu of ancient Israel.

John Dehlin [01:34:36] Right.

David Bokovoy [01:34:36] And so historical criticism presents those specific challenges than to traditional assumptions regarding the Book of Mormon.

John Dehlin [01:34:45] Now, I know that believers are going to say, well, with God, all things are possible. And who's to say that God, just like Joseph, can translate the Book of Moses without any. He can channel the Book of Moses and Abraham without any real source text? Who's to say that Lehi or Moroni weren't just channeling Deutero Isaiah through the gift and power of God.

David Bokovoy [01:35:08] Sure.

John Dehlin [01:35:09] And they didn't need the brass plates.

David Bokovoy [01:35:10] Sure.

John Dehlin [01:35:11] They didn't need Deutero Isaiah in the brass plates.

David Bokovoy [01:35:13] And as I've suggested, if people want to take that perspective on their religious faith and documents, I don't have an issue with that. That would never work for me.

John Dehlin [01:35:26] Why does that work for you?

David Bokovoy [01:35:29] Because I. It doesn't work for me because his. I care about historical scholarship and what that reveals about the origin of this material and how it was created. And to me, Mormonism is not just about what I feel. It's about the development of the mind.

David Bokovoy [01:35:50] It should be anyway. I mean, I see this, this, the development of mine. That certainly is, I've. Regardless, that is my religion is to love, but also to develop the mind and to use reason and science and scholarship to try to improve the condition of humanity upon the planet. So that would not work for me.

David Bokovoy [01:36:10] But I don't have an issue if it works for other people. I just think we need to be honest then and say, yeah, I understand that this flies in the way of all scholarship, the way of all science, but I believe, and this works for me and it works for my family and I have strong spiritual convictions of the truthfulness of this. So I'm going that direction. I just would hope that people would accept that and go with that and, and do that. But it's this meshing of like, scholarship and apologetics of like, oh, we can pick and choose and look, we can sustain this argument through reason and through scholarship, when in reality it cannot be done, not if we're being completely open and honest. It's the evidence leads in one way and traditional assumptions lead the other.

John Dehlin [01:36:53] Okay, are there other big problems with the historical Book of Mormon or whatever that historical criticism sort of uncovers that are anywhere on the same par as deutero Isaiah?

David Bokovoy [01:37:13] Yeah, the references to math, Malachi, and as I mentioned, the New Testament with deutero Isaiah. There's actually a third Isaiah too, in the very final chapters, which is definitely post exilic. And for many years Book of Mormon apologists would say, at least there isn't any third Isaiah, you know, in the, in it. But there is third Isaiah in the Book of Mormon. Colby has found some references to third Isaiah in the Book of Mormon and you know, in almost all the Book of Mormon apologetics that I've read that have addressed this, they've said, well, at least we don't have to deal with this. Issue. Well, sorry, guys. You do. It's there and I'll wait for him to publish that to show it to the world, but it's. It's there. The third Isaiah, which is even the latest.

John Dehlin [01:37:54] And you say Malachi came after the. I would have.

David Bokovoy [01:37:57] Very late.

John Dehlin [01:37:58] So it mentions Malachi.

David Bokovoy [01:38:00] Yeah, and Colby just wrote on that too, in dialogue with Boyd Peterson as the editor. Just. That just came out a couple months ago. Okay, so people can read that one, too.

John Dehlin [01:38:11] Any other. Big.

David Bokovoy [01:38:13] Well, the New Testament references.

John Dehlin [01:38:15] Yeah. Talk about that for a second. Like, I've probably said this a few times, but I'll say it again. How can it be that the literal ancestors of Jesus Christ, the Jews that would have preceded Jesus in Jerusalem or Nazareth or wherever he was in the Holy Land, weren't able to know the name of the Messiah that was coming and weren't practicing things like baptism and what other Christian rituals are in the Book of Mormon? Preaching about an atonement in the same way and a resurrection and a foreknowledge of Mary that it was going to happen in Jerusalem or near Jerusalem or Bethlehem or whatever it was. Like, there's so much Christianity in sort of like the Book of Mormon before Jesus is ever born. Yeah, that's a problem.

David Bokovoy [01:39:04] It is because that's a challenge.

John Dehlin [01:39:06] Because the Native Americans were Christian basically before Christ was born, but the Jews weren't given that same privilege. And they were the actual, legitimate true

David Bokovoy [01:39:16] blood and not just Christians, but Christians that reflected the actual sermon practices and procedures and theological concerns of 19th century American Christians. I mean, that's sort of just a reality of. Of what we see there. And it ignores the fact that what I've tried to explain, we can see the historical evolution of Christology of religion from polytheism to monolatry and hentheism to monotheism to belief in a messiah figure to belief that this Messiah would then suffer and die. This. These things take a long time to evolve and we can document the historical evolution. And then all of a sudden the Book of Mormon comes in and is. It's a book that is completely out of time because it's taking all of this information and putting it as if it exists already in the hearts and minds of American prophets, seers and revelators here on this continent. From an historical perspective, that presents a significant challenge.

John Dehlin [01:40:19] Yeah, yeah, that's a real problem. Okay. Any other thing you want to mention about the Book of Mormon?

David Bokovoy [01:40:28] You know, other. Okay, I would say that, you know, I wouldn't. I. I teach world religions now. I'm going to be teaching world religions in the prison. And I know that a lot of believers hear things like this and they feel attacked, they feel threatened. It makes them feel uncomfortable.

David Bokovoy [01:40:51] I would just say, please understand that scholars, when we deal with these things, we're not trying to destroy faith. And what I tell my students when I teach these things to them, and most of them come from an LDS religious background, and I tell them, look, I'm not asking you to believe in anything I'm saying or to accept this scholarship, but I do think believers should understand the way scholars interpret it and then do with it what you want to do. Dismiss it if you want, but please understand it and, and then recognize that it's not a desire to attack or to. To bring down.

David Bokovoy [01:41:27] It's an. It's a desire to understand the past based upon the best evidence that we have. And there are ways, There are ways for faithful, believing, active, committed Latter Day Saints to acknowledge all of this and to still find themselves as committed Latter Day Saints and to reconcile that with their religious convictions. Yes, it requires a shift of paradigm, but there are ways of making it work. So please don't feel threatened, like your whole world has come crashing down. If that's the case, you find yourself in that position. There are ways of making sense of it that are quite logical and that works. My book presents ways that it works for me.

David Bokovoy [01:42:13] I stand by everything that is there, that is written there. I believe it's possible and logical, and it's something that should not threaten people of faith, but excite them because it's going to teach them a different way of seeing God and the revelatory process that might help them in their own personal relationships with their community and with divinity. That certainly has been the case for me.

David Bokovoy [01:42:37] Taking a different approach that I was forced to adopt concerning scripture and prophets helped me transition away from homophobia to that of a, you know, of an ally of being someone who was so concerned when my wife walked out of that Harvard Square Theater and was feeling love and sympathy for the portrayal of those who love each other but cannot be together. And I felt concerned that she was buying into Hollywood's gay agenda as where I was at religiously at the time. I thank God that I made the choice to pursue historical critical scholarship because it has made me a better human being. I am more open and sensitive to those who struggle.

David Bokovoy [01:43:22] I feel kinship and connection with those outside of my faith that I wouldn't have felt. It is changed everything for me in the sense of making me so that I am a different person, open to truth, even when it challenges my preconceptions. And I. I'm very grateful for it. So, yes, I understand it's threatening to traditional believers, but there are ways of. Of making sense of it.

John Dehlin [01:43:51] Yeah. Again, David Bacavoy's creative and refreshing and enlightening contribution to Mormon stories is. You're saying it's all messy and it's beautiful and it can still be inspiring in scripture instead of it's all messy, therefore throw it all away and it's all garbage and worthless and silly.

David Bokovoy [01:44:13] Yeah. And although I would say. And that's how I feel about it, but I also want to be clear that, you know, I reckon I've got lots of post Mormon friends, that it's just. For them, they just have to completely disag, disengage. And if people are in that situation, and that's good for them emotionally and spiritually, I support that 100%. I wouldn't try to convince them otherwise. If something is. If it's a bad or negative influence in our lives, we should. And that would include religion.

Theories on Book of Mormon Origins

John Dehlin [01:44:49] So, really quickly, do you have a theory about, you know, the. Everyone. And we could do a whole episode on this and maybe we'll have you back when we really dig into Mormon truth claims in the Book of Mormon. Do you have a personal theory of how the Book of Mormon was created? You've read all the Dan Vogel stuff. Have you put together a timeline or a theory on kind of how it happens?

David Bokovoy [01:45:09] I. Not exactly. I've been working on it for many years. I think I'd like.

John Dehlin [01:45:13] You have been.

David Bokovoy [01:45:14] Yeah, I'd like to write a book on it at some point.

John Dehlin [01:45:17] Oh, man, I'd love that.

David Bokovoy [01:45:19] I'd like to. I'd like to do that at some point. That's something I have.

John Dehlin [01:45:22] Because where's a single book that sort of says, here's how I think the Book of Mormon came together?

David Bokovoy [01:45:26] Yeah, we don't really.

John Dehlin [01:45:27] Does that exist?

David Bokovoy [01:45:28] No, not really.

John Dehlin [01:45:28] Even Dan Vogel hasn't written that book. Dan Vogel, what is going on, brother?

David Bokovoy [01:45:32] We got a lot of great articles and a lot of great scholarship that has been done, but there should just be a book.

John Dehlin [01:45:36] Yeah, here's a theory on how the Book of Mormon came together.

David Bokovoy [01:45:39] And that would work. And it would explain, explain and show how beautiful the Book of Mormon is. And. And what. And the amazing thing that Joseph Smith accomplished. I mean, this is incredible that he produced something that has been so transformative spiritually for millions of people.

John Dehlin [01:45:54] It's Hard to deny that.

David Bokovoy [01:45:55] Yeah, I mean, it's just, it reality is. But like I said, as an historian, man, especially if you go read all of the documents that Dan Vogel has assembled in the early Mormon documents collection, I can't remember how many volumes, like six volumes or whatever. And you go through that and you can see, man, it just changes you, you can see the narrative of the Book of Mormon in all of Joseph Smith's treasure digging and seer stone activities and, you know, traditions of guardian angels and all of it just emerge right out of his cultural milieu.

David Bokovoy [01:46:28] And then you have this creative genius who is so adept at telling stories and who has, is surrounded by Indian origins and who knows the Bible really, really well. I, I, we do not recognize how well Joseph Smith knew that Bible. He knew it, that that was his book. He lived in that Bible and it, when he spoke, he spoke scriptures, he spoke the word that came out of there and he, his language, his words were the words of the King James Bible and everything that he did. So it's an extraordinary accomplishment without question, but it's also one that from a historical perspective can be explained as a product of Joseph Smith.

John Dehlin [01:47:14] And so you're saying you want to wait to tell us kind of your theories on the authorship.

David Bokovoy [01:47:17] I've kind of given you hints on it. Yeah, but I, yeah, but I, of where it is, but yeah. And I don't know that I have all the answers or have everything off formulated in my mind yet either.

John Dehlin [01:47:28] Do you, do you think it's a single author? Do you think Cowdery or Rigdon or Lucy or any of those comes from.

David Bokovoy [01:47:37] I think it all can be attributed to Joseph Smith.

John Dehlin [01:47:41] Okay. And does it have to have been written in 30 days or that really constricted, narrow timeframe that they want us to.

David Bokovoy [01:47:48] You know what? Sure. I mean, that's. In a sense it is, but in the sense, Joseph Smith was writing the Book of Mormon his whole life, right?

John Dehlin [01:47:56] What do you mean?

David Bokovoy [01:47:57] Well, I mean, he was having the experiences with, with the Bible and struggling with questions of religion and the baptism of infants and which church to join and his father's universalism, which is addressed in the Book of Mormon and then his mother's commitment to, you know, Presbyterianism and how this makes conflicts in home, and he's trying to resolve this in his mind and you Scripture to do this. It just. Joseph Smith was creating the Book of Mormon his whole life up to that point and came out

John Dehlin [01:48:36] and it could have, could it have been written in a year or in a Couple years or.

David Bokovoy [01:48:40] And the complexity that we see happening there. A lot of it happens because of the actual historical events that that took place with, you know, the loss of 116 man pages of the manuscript that will dictate it as well. As we see evolution from historical critical perspective in the development of the Book of Mormon itself, for example, a lot of people will talk about the fact that if you approach it in, in terms of its translation production, as Brent Metcalfe originally showed, that is now universally accepted. The first text of the Book of Mormon that was created was Mosiah.

David Bokovoy [01:49:20] And then he went from Mosiah through what is, you know, those large plates. Well, if you go. It's interesting that if you jump to King Benjamin, who should have had the writings of Nephi and Lehi and had all that material, what does he find in the. But he says, well, it's been revealed to me from an angel that God himself is going to come down on earth and his name will be Jesus and his mother will be Mary.

David Bokovoy [01:49:46] Well, historical critics will read that and say, well, why did he need an angel? If all that material preexisted and he had access to Nephi's writings, he would have known that already. Why does he need to present it as if it's a new revelation? But from an historical perspective, First Nephi, second Nephi, that stuff hadn't been created yet by Joseph Smith. This is the way historical critics see it. And so that's why it's a new revelation.

John Dehlin [01:50:09] First Nephi got written. Later, after the 116 pages got stolen. Yeah, they had to go back and rewrite the beginning of the story. And they decided. He decided to make it a religious narrative because the previous one was some other type of narrative that wasn't as

David Bokovoy [01:50:26] religious, didn't have all the. That wouldn't have had all of that.

John Dehlin [01:50:28] And so this would have required Benjamin, King Benjamin, to have a revelation when

David Bokovoy [01:50:32] he wouldn't have needed it because it was explicitly stated in Scripture that should have existed and that he should have had access to, to. And according to the Book of Mormon itself that he trained his sons in and they knew it. And then why then. And then you then you start to wonder and think about questions such as why those opening chapters of the Book of Mormon as they were produced from Mosiah and Alma, none of them talk about Jesus's visit. It's as if from an historical critical perspective that Joseph hasn't yet gotten to the idea that Jesus will visit America. It's all absent in those sections but if you go to first Nephi, second Nephi, Jacob, Enos, Jerome, Omni, the small plates, Jesus is coming to America, something that they're really excited about.

David Bokovoy [01:51:16] So, and I am please understand, I am not saying, I mean, there are lots of ways that apologists have looked at these things and have given explanations for them. Some work, some don't, some are fine. I'm just saying that his from an historical critical perspective that takes, that doesn't take into consideration God creating the book. It's easily explainable as something that Joseph Smith created. And so that's what happens.

Hebrew Connections and Expansion Theory

John Dehlin [01:51:45] Tony is asking, Tony Fieldson, please ask David about what you what he currently thinks about what you wrote in your first book about Hebrew connections to the Book of Mormon. And maybe you gave some speeches at some early apologist conferences, maybe talking about Hebraisms, what's the term in the Book of Mormon? How do you explain the emergence of those connections if Joseph and any of his contemporaries could have made all those up?

David Bokovoy [01:52:17] KEITH so I've been asked this question and I I never I try to be very careful in my language. Even in those earliest publications of mine, I never wanted to suggest that it was impossible for Joseph Smith to come up with these things on his own. I always found like that sort of claim to be much too strong, even in my most conservative believing years of whatever that might be. And I'm not saying I never spoke in that terms of language, but if I did, I tried to avoid that. That's not language that I would use.

David Bokovoy [01:52:54] And I have documented a lot of those. And I think the suggestion that would have been impossible for Joseph Smith to create such things is just that's not a good historical argument because historians, as I mentioned before, we're trying to uncover what most likely happened in the past based upon the evidence. And if Joseph Smith translated this book by the gift and power of God and it was given to him by an angel, then all of those things are miracles.

David Bokovoy [01:53:24] And by definition, a miracle is the least likely thing to have happened. That's what makes it a miracle. And so if we use miracles to talk about the past, even though miracles do happen all the time, we can't rely upon those without evidence, and we just don't have the evidence to make that where that sort of assertion that things like that would have been impossible for Joseph Smith to uncover. Many of the Hebraisms and things like that that are identified that I've seen, some of them are King James ism, like, for example, a big one that is emphasized is the Cognate accusative.

David Bokovoy [01:54:03] The accusative is a, in a sentence, grammatically is the direct object. And cognate accusative is a technical term for when the verb and the direct object are the same. So Hebraism would be when Lehi says, behold, I have dreamed a dream.

David Bokovoy [01:54:22] So in English, we wouldn't say, I have dreamed a dream. We just said, I had a dream. And so we point that out as a Hebraism, which it is. But that doesn't mean the Book of Mormon is a translation, because you'll find King James references to dream to Dream and, and other sources that were familiar to Joseph Smith, that he had access to Joseph Smith's vocabulary because of his extensive study of the Bible. He spoke.

David Bokovoy [01:54:53] He spoke in Hebraisms, he spoke in Hebraism. That was because of his. Because the King James Bible tries to oftentimes be very literal and its reproduction of some of that phraseology. And so it sounds like scripture. I mean, Latter Day Saints do this all the time today. I mean, we speak in the and thine and ye and thou and thine and these archaic English pronouns because it sounds like scripture to us. But that's not how Jesus spoke.

John Dehlin [01:55:23] It's not a Native American spoke.

David Bokovoy [01:55:25] That's not how they walked around speaking in those languages. It's all King James's. But it sounds. Sounds like scripture. So we incorporate it when we start talking to God or when we start, you know, giving sermons or what happens. Why would we think Joseph Smith wouldn't have done that in the creation of his sacred text, when in fact, it's easily documented that he did? Now, that's not to say that Joseph Smith didn't do some extraordinary things in his. The way that he was able to. I mean, the Book of Mormon, from a literary perspective, it's a schematic narrative, which is a different type of narrative than most Westerners are familiar with.

David Bokovoy [01:56:03] But a schematic narrative, once you learn to read it and appreciate it as literature, is really a cool text to read. And the Book of Mormon incorporates type scenes and biblical literary devices and things that are extraordinary to suggest that they were beyond the ability of Joseph Smith. I certainly don't believe that. But they're certain, but they're there and they're awesome and they're fun to uncover.

John Dehlin [01:56:30] So you weren't, you weren't highlighting the Hebraisms in the Book of Mormon to try and claim that it's an ancient text?

David Bokovoy [01:56:39] I wouldn't say. I never did that.

John Dehlin [01:56:42] Maybe there was a time, early years

David Bokovoy [01:56:44] maybe late 1990s, probably.

John Dehlin [01:56:48] Okay.

David Bokovoy [01:56:48] Probably kind of to make an argument that at least it could be there. But it was, but I never did it in the sense of this is impossible. You know, you add up enough of these things, I think. I'm sure I wanted to do that to like give it plausibility, which is different than proving it. I never felt the reality, the historical tools lead us to the conclusion that it's not. I've always recognized that even when I was writing in the 1990s, late 1990s, and that book that I did with John Twentis on the Testaments, I still recognized that if we were, if we took all of the evidence, it would lead to a different conclusion. All I wanted to do was to make it, I guess make it interesting and, and I guess plausible. And later I just wanted to make it interesting.

Choosing an Apologist to Write the Foreword

John Dehlin [01:57:37] Okay. All right. Talk briefly about your choice to have John Welch or Jack Welch write the forward to this book. I was really surprised. I think in, in the circles I've run in, he's often lumped into the Daniel Peterson, Lewis Midgley kind of crowd, even the Hugh Nibley crowd of like kind of those old school apologists that have either use pseudoscience or ad hominem or those sorts of tactics that has given Mormon apologetics such a bad name. And then of course, he's known as the guy that has found chiasmus, I guess, in the Book of Mormon, which is also found in Dr. Seuss. But for him, finding chiasmus in the Book of Mormon proves that it's a historical document or ancient document.

John Dehlin [01:58:29] And for people in my circles, that's all just kind of silliness. And then all the apologetics, Mormon apologetics 1.0 stuff is just like a huge embarrassment to Mormonism. And yet he wrote your forward. So I'm sure I've never met the man.

John Dehlin [01:58:47] I don't know anything about him and I'm sure I've got a completely messed up version of him because it's all biased and stilted and inadequate and I've never even met him. So can you talk about that?

David Bokovoy [01:58:59] Sure. Jack Welch was a. Let's see. First of all, I would say, yes, he is the found original founder of farms. He is also a very kind, loving gentleman. And I. He has always stayed above the, the fray that others have enjoyed getting into. So I do not see him as one who's been involved with negative or attack aggressive. He's never been involved with any those types of apologetics. That's just foreign to his personality.

John Dehlin [01:59:38] Okay.

David Bokovoy [01:59:41] Now, he was my teacher. I. As an undergraduate, I got to know him. And then, you know, as I continue with my education, he was always very kind to me. He gave the very first presentation at the Society of Biblical Literature Convention that A first Mormon. The time a Mormon had ever gave a presentation there. It was while I was in Boston, it was 1999, I want to say, on his work on the Sermon on the Mount, showing that it was, you know, connecting it with temple ritual. I sat there and I thought that was wonderful. And I was impressed. And I thought, I want to do that same thing. I want to do what Jack is doing here at the Society of Biblical Literature. I want to be that type of scholar for the church and representation of our faith. So he meant a lot to me. And then so has.

John Dehlin [02:00:35] Has. He's engaged in legitimate, credible scholarship.

David Bokovoy [02:00:40] Yeah.

John Dehlin [02:00:41] Okay. So. Yeah, yeah.

David Bokovoy [02:00:43] Oh, yeah, yeah. He has.

John Dehlin [02:00:44] You know, he's an attorney. Law professor.

David Bokovoy [02:00:46] Yeah. And he's. He. He likes to. To delve into biblical law. He takes a very different approach than the historical critical one that I take. Nonetheless, I really love him and I look up to him, and he was, you know, this big influence for me. Thinking my early years, I'm like, that's what I want to do. I meant. It meant a lot to me. See that. And then Jack has always been very kind to me. One of the times when I was paying for my own way to go to the Society of Biblical Literature Convention and, you know, my BYU colleagues without any training in biblical scholarship were going on the, you know, the church's dime.

David Bokovoy [02:01:23] Jack reached out to me and he said, if you'll come help me man the booth here for. For the Maxwell Institute, I'll help you pay your. Pay your way. We shared a hotel. We prayed together in. In the morning. And he is a wonderful, loving, kind Christian man whom I revere. So that was, you know, the primary driver there. Then there was also a driver that I thought, if Jack would be willing to do that, it would help protect my book, it would help to protect me. I realized that what I was saying would make some people feel uncomfortable, especially in light of my profession.

David Bokovoy [02:02:02] And so I thought maybe if. If there was this, you know, introduction by Jack Welch was so highly respected that it would give. It might open the doors for people to be a little bit more receptive to what I was saying in light of his reputation. And that proved to be the case.

David Bokovoy [02:02:21] I never faced any questions or concerns about the book from CES administrators, from anyone in church education it was just, you know, that was never a topic of concern or issue. And probably Jack in his introduction may be one of the reasons why.

John Dehlin [02:02:39] And I think you may have mentioned to me offline that your editor deserves a little bit of the credit for that idea.

David Bokovoy [02:02:45] Yeah, it was actually. The idea was actually, it wasn't Lloyd's idea. It was Brad Kramer. Okay, Brad Kramer. Brad Kramer. We were talking about this and I said, well, I don't know, I'm gonna get to write the foreword. And Brad was like, how well do you know Jack? And I'm like, actually know Jack really well. And so, yeah, that was a. That was a great move. Thank you, Brad. And thank you, Jack. I'm grateful to both.

John Dehlin [02:03:14] Do you. What do you think about the idea that Kaiserbus in the Book of Mormon bolsters the claim that it's a historical document?

David Bokovoy [02:03:22] I usually say it's easy to fake a chiasm.

John Dehlin [02:03:26] Can you say that in a chiasm?

David Bokovoy [02:03:32] No, I mean, by this, I mean, I really think that if you take a large enough document, especially one that's prone towards repetition, which the Book of Mormon is, and you start to extract major sections of it, you'll find chiastic structures happening. It's a natural way of articulating speech and of making central and important points. I mean, if we just think about reversing structure and how that happens, I mean, it's an argumentation, essays and everywhere that we look. So I don't see chiastic structures as evidence for its ancient authenticity. I, in fact, I don't know that I ever really saw that. That having been said, I think it's a beautiful literary observation to uncover those and to see them the way that Jack and others have. And I think it's beautiful. But evidence of its antiquity? Absolutely not.

John Dehlin [02:04:34] Tell us a bit about what Blake Ostler's expansion theory is about and. And your thoughts on that.

David Bokovoy [02:04:40] Okay, so Blake Ostler, Mormon philosopher and dialogue, I don't remember the date off the top of my head, was really the first to articulate this idea of an expansion model. That there was a historic core to the Book of Mormon and that Joseph Smith was inspired to add things into it that reflect the 19th century worldview that he, that he lives in. I think most Book of Mormon scholars today who are believing accept that as. As a fact.

John Dehlin [02:05:13] So in addition to whatever inspiration he got, he's mixing in his own words, his own nouns, his own stories, been

David Bokovoy [02:05:21] some historic basic core to the Book of Mormon that was then expanded upon either by Joseph Smith's own imprint or even by divine inspiration. Inspiration. A lot of scholars that are believing will say, you know, they'll handle the deutero Isaiah material that way. And they'll say, okay, God wanted that stuff in the book. He wanted it so that he could use Isaiah to help connect all of this material together for the spiritual benefit of humanity.

David Bokovoy [02:05:49] So that's the way that's often looked upon and how it's explained. And I think it's very viable. Certainly the model that I, that I bought into for many, many years. It just becomes problematic because at some point in time you have to look and say, okay, if I take out all the 19th century elements of it, what am I left with? Where's the historic core? And, and I don't know how to find that. I can't find that because it's just those 19th century elements are so central to the entire structure. Structure, as I illustrated with the deutero Isaiah example that I provided. That's why I chose that one to show that it's beginning, it's middle, it's the end, it's.

David Bokovoy [02:06:31] You can't take that out. If you take that out, what are we left with? And the answer is I don't know. So as a historian, I, I don't know what to do with that. As a believer who wanted some ancient core, it's certainly the model that I embraced for many years.

John Dehlin [02:06:51] Yeah. So, and that's, and I guess expansion theory would, would say that the reason why steel and horses and elephants that are likely anachronistic in the Book of Mormon appear there is because Joseph's seeing animals and tools that he may not have a proper name for. And so he's just kind of calling them whatever name he has access to in the 19th century.

David Bokovoy [02:07:18] Yeah.

John Dehlin [02:07:19] And maybe all the names, if there was a Lemuel that he knew down the road or a layman or Lehi's dream or whatever. Nouns, people, names, objects, stories. The reason why the Book of Mormon is dripping with Joseph Smith and his History in 19th century Evangelical Protestantism and themes, Masonic themes and all that is because it's sort of Joseph being creative and mixing in a soup of some, like you said, some historical kernel with the New Testament, with the Old Testament, with his father's dreams, with Joseph Smith Sr's dreams, with his Protestant sermons that are happening. All that's true. And there's still a historical core. Yeah, right.

David Bokovoy [02:08:12] Yeah, that's. And that's the essence of it for me. It just, it comes down to ultimately consistency. Am I Applying the historical critical method consistently, or am I picking and choosing portions of it that sustain my traditional religious assumptions? If I'm doing that, then that's a problem for me. I want to be consistent. So I guess that's the way that I would respond to that.

John Dehlin [02:08:36] Okay, we're. We're probably five minutes away from me having to run, and I still have at least an hour more worth of questions for you, so I don't know what to do with that exactly, but we'll cross that bridge when we come to it. But I do have a couple final questions. I was struck by this idea that, thinking back to your own narrative, um, that it. It wasn't all these problems with the Book of Mormon that sunk your devotion to active, faithful Mormonism. It was your daughter and prop. Well, it was pro. It was. It was a November 2015 policy. But then find having your daughter come out to you, that was kind of a one, two punch.

Personal Faith Journey and Leaving the Church

David Bokovoy [02:09:21] Yeah.

John Dehlin [02:09:23] So the first question I had is, what. What if BYU had hired you?

David Bokovoy [02:09:28] Yeah.

John Dehlin [02:09:29] And then have you thought of, and it's almost for me, a scary thought. What if David Bacavoy had gotten hired at byu?

David Bokovoy [02:09:38] Yeah.

John Dehlin [02:09:40] And then your job and your pension and your reputation is all tied to being that faithful defender of the faith. But knowing higher criticism, but being an apologist, as they expect BYU professors to do, your whole livelihood would have been tied to remaining faithful.

David Bokovoy [02:10:00] Yeah, but it already was.

John Dehlin [02:10:03] Yeah, it was. It was.

David Bokovoy [02:10:04] I mean, that's.

John Dehlin [02:10:05] But BYU was the ultimate dream.

David Bokovoy [02:10:07] It was definitely, but.

John Dehlin [02:10:09] So it's like it's different to quit in a Triple A. It's different to quit baseball when you're in a. AAA farm league team. Yeah. It's another thing to walk away from baseball when you're in the major leagues. I don't know if that's a fair.

David Bokovoy [02:10:21] No, I think that's a fair analogy, but I would have anyway. I mean, as it is, I took a huge financial pay cut with an uncertain future once it reached the point where I just felt like I needed to be true to my employer, I needed to be true to the church, I. I couldn't keep accepting pay cuts, paychecks from them, and earn a retirement from them when I had reached a point where I just could not sustain the theology and the institution in light of the damage that I saw that was happening to LGBTQ people. And so, yeah, granted, it would have added a layer to it, I suppose, as a BYU professor.

David Bokovoy [02:11:14] You're right. Without question. But still. Yeah. It couldn't have gone any other way for me, I just feel too passionately, as I shared in the previous discussions, that I just. This epiphany that, as I shared, I will never, ever, ever allow religious authorities, no matter how much I love them or revere them, to step in the way, to stand in the way of my devotion to human rights and social justice. I cannot do that. I can't wait. I can't wait. I love the church. I wish. I miss it. I miss many aspects of it. And it's hard. It's hard when you've devoted your whole life to something because of your love, your education, the financial debt.

David Bokovoy [02:12:04] I mean, just think of student loan debts and things when you're raising four kids and trying to live out east and in Boston and go through that. I mean, we'll. We'll never recover. I devoted every. I gave everything.

David Bokovoy [02:12:17] And I don't regret that. I do not regret that, because I am so grateful that for what Mormonism has done for me. I mean, it's helped me have a compassion and a concern for service and a desire to pursue education. All of that stems from my Mormon upbringing.

David Bokovoy [02:12:35] It's helped me in so many ways. I love Joseph Smith. I love the Book of Mormon. I love the church. I cannot support or sustain, though the theology and the policies that are hurting people.

John Dehlin [02:12:52] So you. So you think if it's impossible to know, but had you been hired by BYU and gotten that job once November 2015 and rolled around, you wouldn't have been able to.

David Bokovoy [02:13:05] Would have taken me a while. Like it did take me a while then to figure it all out, but

John Dehlin [02:13:09] you would have left eventually. Okay.

David Bokovoy [02:13:11] Without question.

John Dehlin [02:13:12] And then how do we.

David Bokovoy [02:13:14] Yeah, that's not even. I. I'm not even a doubt. It just. It would have gone on and then I just would have started looking for jobs. The problem outside. The problem is, though, it's. BYU is a terminal position because once you enter into that and especially start publishing on the Book of Mormon, it's very difficult to get picked up, especially at secular academic institutions for religious studies or Bible scholarship. That could have been a challenge, but something would have worked out. I mean, it did, and I'm very happy.

John Dehlin [02:13:45] And. And then I'm just thinking about, you know, there was a time where I got to know Spencer Fluman a little bit and Patrick Mason, and I know Phil Barlow, and I know, you know, I've gotten to hang out with Richard Bushman and Claudia and Terrell and Fiona, and there's so many people that have continued almost seemingly unfazed like people that I would suspect would have the same sensibilities as you and I, because I would've liked it. Think. Even if in some weird alternative universe, I had ended up at BYU teaching whatever, psychology, teaching, technology, whatever it was, I would hope that I would have made that same choice given my commitment to civil rights.

John Dehlin [02:14:30] Well, I know the people whose names I just mentioned are also very committed to civil rights, and they care about LGBT people, and they don't, like, mean things and bad things and people kill themselves. And yet so many of those really good people aren't fazed and stay on that path. How do you make sense of that?

David Bokovoy [02:14:54] I think they are fazed, and I'm not going to mention specifics, but I. Specific individuals, but I do. I mean, that was. I was trying to explain it to it. I had a bishop who came up to me because I was still attending, and my wife and my two teen teenagers at home were not. And. And he was very kind, and he was very sweet, and he's. He was trying to show compassion, and he was said, you know, I. I get it. It's like, for your family, it's. It's kind of like for a lot of other families in our ward that were so committed to the Scout program, and now the church has backed away and issued a policy against the Scouting program, and that's how it is for your family with LGBTQ issues and the policy.

David Bokovoy [02:15:41] And I just said, oh, no, it's not. It's not. It's not at all like that. Please let me help you understand where I'm coming from. I don't know that you could find someone who loves the LDS Church and has given more than I have.

David Bokovoy [02:15:56] I've spent my whole life, my career, my finances, my education, everything. Everything that I had for love of it. And then now I said, if my daughter has a biological or an adopted child and turns to me and says, dad, sure, go ahead, and you can take my. You can take your grandson to church.

David Bokovoy [02:16:23] I could take my grandson to church. And I said, bishop, his wife was the primary president. And I said, your. Your wife would. She wouldn't say, no, your grandson can't come. He has gay parents. You guys would welcome him. He said, of course we would. So you would welcome my grandson? You would let my grandson come and learn about the church and learn everything about this?

David Bokovoy [02:16:47] But I could not bless that grandson. I could not give him a name in the church. I could not baptize that grandson. I could not give that grandson the gift of the Holy Ghost. So the argument that this is done to protect the children because we don't want cognitive dissonance based upon our doctrine and based upon what they are here experiencing at home, makes no intellectual sense. Because we're not saying to these children of gay parents, you can't come to church. We're saying, you cannot have a saving ordinance.

David Bokovoy [02:17:22] You cannot have the gift of the Holy Ghost, not because of who you are or any choice that you have made, but because of what your parents did. I said, bishop, I am not asking you to agree with me that the policy is wrong. I'm not going to try to make that argument. But I would just like you to understand it's a little bit more difficult than somebody that's disappointed that there's not a scouting program anymore in the church.

David Bokovoy [02:17:49] That's. That was our conversation, and it just. Yeah, I just. I. I just. I cannot. That's just. And again, I love the general authorities. I believe, and I am sincerely believe, even when I disagree, that they are good men that are trying to make sense of their deep spiritual and doctrinal convictions in light of a rapidly changing world.

David Bokovoy [02:18:16] And I support them and sustain them in that effort because I know that's a big challenge. But they've gone a direction right now that, as much as I love them, I cannot follow.

Advice for Those Navigating Church Doubts

John Dehlin [02:18:26] Last question for today. What would you say to someone who said to you, okay, great, LGBT stuff is a problem, but it's just the end of a super long list of major glaring smoking guns and problems. Old Testament, New Testament, Book of Abraham, Book of Moses book, you know, Book of Mormon, polygamy, polyandry, Mountain Meadows massacre, peep stones, folk magic. Like, what if someone were to say to you, what took you so long? Or what about just feminism and women being subjugated? Or all the racism and the cultural genocide of the Native Americans and the Indian placement program and the racism in the Book of Mormon and. And, you know, the mall. And there's a million things that someone could say it took you that long. Like, sure, there were a hundred smoking guns along the way that you could have seen at any point.

David Bokovoy [02:19:26] Yeah.

John Dehlin [02:19:27] What. What. How do you explain.

David Bokovoy [02:19:29] I'd say that it. It wasn't as if it was just the policy. And I'm just like, okay, that's. I can't keep going down that. It was all those. There were all those things that you

John Dehlin [02:19:37] mentioned, but someone could say, why didn't. That if Fawn Brody could write in 1945, no man knows my history. If the Tanners could do what they do in the 60s, you know, and if you knew all this stuff, starting at your BYU years, what took you so long? And I'm not trying to be insulted, because I have deep respect for you.

David Bokovoy [02:19:55] No, I know that it's a great question, and I would just say I'm an absolute believer. I mean, that's what it comes down to. I mean, it's not like I, I was just shifting paradigms because I thought, oh, this will bring me a paycheck, or, you know, this will let me have my career that I want, or. No, it was that I had deep, powerful spiritual experiences with Mormonism that are very real to me, that I'm very grateful for that. I just so you know that when that happens, I don't think it's. That's not something you just walk away from.

John Dehlin [02:20:38] It takes a lot.

David Bokovoy [02:20:39] Yeah. And I'm. And I haven't walked away now. I, I get. I get messages from people now that have concern, and they're like, oh, you've left the church. I don't feel like I've left the church. Yeah. I don't attend, and, and I, and I can't see myself attending anymore. But I, I, it's something I've devoted my life to. I'm going down with a ship.

John Dehlin [02:21:00] Yeah.

David Bokovoy [02:21:01] I mean, I want to help. I want to help people in my community. I want to help the church leaders. I want to help. I want to. I want to help Mormonism grow and become the most beautiful thing that it possibly can. And the extent that I'm allowed to do that, I'll. I'll offer my services and, and, you know, do that, because I, It's. We're talking about a deep love affair.

John Dehlin [02:21:27] And I think, I think also you were inoculated. Your, Your early exposure to varying points of view and that flexibility that you talk about in those BYU years or the UVU years, whatever they were, were you just sort of getting used to a shifting paradigm?

David Bokovoy [02:21:46] Yeah.

John Dehlin [02:21:47] As David Bacavoy.

David Bokovoy [02:21:48] Yeah.

John Dehlin [02:21:49] It's almost like from an early set of years, develop. Developing a very flexible view of the gospel.

David Bokovoy [02:21:58] Yeah.

John Dehlin [02:21:59] Sets you up to be very flexible for all these different problems.

David Bokovoy [02:22:03] That's a. And that's a very important part of my narrative. That's why I tell that story. I mean, it was. I'd been home for two months on my mission, and I am up in the archives, and I found that article. And then Eugene England and Bruce Summer, I'm telling you. So it just, with my studies, it just required constant movement and shift and Flexibility. And, and, and I do not judge anyone who like, reads the CES letter and is exposed to that. The first, a lot of my friends, I've got lots of friends now that read the CES letter.

John Dehlin [02:22:31] That was the first exposure, 15 minutes.

David Bokovoy [02:22:33] And they're just like, what am I

John Dehlin [02:22:34] going to do now?

David Bokovoy [02:22:34] And they're just like. And, and I, some of my dearest, closest friends, and I don't look at that and say, oh, you're so naive or, you know, you're so silly and why did you have this black and white viewpoint in the perspective? Everybody has their own journey and it's, it was just very different for me. Exactly. It was a demand of 20 some odd years of incredible flexibility.

John Dehlin [02:22:57] Stretching and stretching and stretching and stretching.

David Bokovoy [02:22:59] Yeah. So that, like, you know, I just, for me, it, you know, those, the issues that we've talked about, historical criticism. I had ways of making sense of it and still do and preserving the inspiration of Joseph Smith and all that scripture. And so it. No, that stuff would never lead me to a discontinue. I don't need the church to be true with a capital T, I need it to be good with a capital G. Yeah.

John Dehlin [02:23:25] And I also have to think that immersing yourself in the scriptures for that long, how could you not love, grow to love them so much as you clearly have to where you want to hold on.

David Bokovoy [02:23:37] Oh, yeah.

John Dehlin [02:23:38] You want to hold on because you love those scriptures.

David Bokovoy [02:23:40] Absolutely.

John Dehlin [02:23:41] It's obvious you still do.

David Bokovoy [02:23:42] Yeah.

John Dehlin [02:23:43] God or God or Moses may not exist or Nephi, but you love those scriptures.

David Bokovoy [02:23:48] I do, I do, I do. And it, you know, that's just there are, you know, for people that are on the outside who look at it and think, how the hell can he do that? The reality is, it's how many people just love Tolkien's work or how many people absolutely love Shakespeare or experts in those various.

John Dehlin [02:24:08] Or J.K. rowling.

David Bokovoy [02:24:09] Yeah, exactly. And you know, not that I'm saying it's the exact equivalent. Yeah, it's not and I recognize that. But that's, yeah, those, these texts have changed my life and shaped my viewpoint. The reason my religion is love and the reason I'm devoted to service, the reason I'm devoted to changing the world and making heaven on earth. That's all because of Jesus. The reason I'm devoted to social justice, let's the Hebrew prophets, that's King Benjamin, the reason I want to eradicate poverty and end war. It's all in those scriptures. Everything that is good in my life has come because of those scriptures, because of Joseph Smith and because of Mormonism, including my wife and my children. And I thank God for that. And I'm so, so grateful. And I want to help. And I love them, love the church, love its leaders. I just, I hope we can do better.

Closing Reflections and Farewell

John Dehlin [02:25:02] That's how we're ending this interview with David Bakavoy, at least today. What a beautiful ending.

David Bokovoy [02:25:07] Thank you. Thank you, John, for the, I mean, it just, we did hours of this and I'm so grateful for this venue to share my story. I, I'm so grateful that it's helped. I've got so many messages of people that it's really helped. And I, I, I, that's why I wanted to share. So thank you for hosting.

John Dehlin [02:25:22] Well, I just want to tell you, well, how much of a pleasure it's been to have you. I hope we'll have you back. I have hours more of questions for you. But I just think it's ironic that one of the strongest witnesses I've ever heard for the Book of Mormon comes from someone who's left the church or at least who's no longer practicing in the church.

David Bokovoy [02:25:44] Okay. Independent Mormon.

John Dehlin [02:25:45] And it's not just your, your verbal witness of the beauty and of the power and of the significance of those scriptures, but it's how you live your life and your integrity, your kindness, your compassion. You know, your life is a testament to the power of the scriptures, even if they're not historically true.

David Bokovoy [02:26:06] Thank you.

John Dehlin [02:26:07] And it's a twist, something I'm not used to, but something that I find very beautiful. And I'm just so thrilled that you shared your, you, David Bachavoy, with us. Not just your wisdom, but you.

David Bokovoy [02:26:22] Thank you so much. You're a good friend.

John Dehlin [02:26:26] Listeners, thank you for joining us today on Mormon Stories. I don't know, is that seven or eight hours of David Bacavoy? And we're not done, but we'll see if we can get him back to answer the rest of my questions. But email us@mormonstoriesmail.com Go up to the website and share your thoughts and feelings. Please share these episodes with the everybody because everybody, Mormon and not, needs to hear this stuff. Share it on Facebook, on Twitter, on Instagram. Buy this book from Greg Coford Books. Authoring the Old Testament Genesis through Deuteronomy. People are expecting a couple more volumes. Do you think they'll ever happen?

David Bokovoy [02:27:00] I hope so. I hope so.

John Dehlin [02:27:04] It's hard to keep your mojo.

David Bokovoy [02:27:05] That policy took a lot of wind out of my sails, but I'M starting to get it back.

John Dehlin [02:27:08] Okay, so we'll see if those happen. And I want that Book of Mormon explanation book as well. David Bacavoy, Good luck with the prison system, but also thank you to all the donors who make Mormon Stories and the Open Stories foundation possible. We couldn't do without you. Thank you to Holly Alden for helping us acquire this new facility that we're going to beautify. Thank you to Cody Layton for producing these episodes. He does a great job. Thanks to the Open Storage foundation board, which includes Kim Sandberg Turner, Steve Holbrook, Nadine McCombs Hansen, and Jeremy McDonald, with an assist from Craig Woodfield, who oversees our finances because he's awesome.

John Dehlin [02:27:50] Thanks to all of you who make this possible. And if you really loved this content, if you really value it, we can't do this without contributions. So please donate to the Open Stories foundation. Go to MormonStories.org, click on the donate button. 1050, $100 a month. Whatever you can afford.

John Dehlin [02:28:06] It's all tax deductible in the US and it goes towards sustaining the mission of the foundation, supporting the other podcasters. Dan Witherspoon Mormon Matters Podcast Gina Colvin A Thoughtful Faith podcast. Love and blessings to Gina Colvin as she's facing excommunication now on the tail of Bill Real, who we also love and send a shout out to who we found out today was, excuse me, excommunicated. Love to you, Bill Real. Our thoughts and prayers are with you. And a huge shout out to Brother Jake Jake Frost, who we found out experienced cardiac arrest last week and has been on life support.

John Dehlin [02:28:42] Jake Frost has given us so much. He's such a beautiful, creative soul where our thoughts are prayers with him. We hope he has a recovery and or our thoughts or prayers are with him and his family at this very difficult time. We love you, Jake, Brother Jake Frost.

John Dehlin [02:28:58] And anyway, please support us Mormon Stories when you can and we'll just keep doing this for as long as you support us. So again, love you, David Bachvoy. Take care.

David Bokovoy [02:29:08] Thank you, brother.

John Dehlin [02:29:09] All right, join us again soon with Mormon Stories. Everybody. Take care.

Transcript © 2026 John P. Dehlin. All rights reserved. Brief quotations are welcome with attribution and a link to mormonstories.org; all other use requires written permission.