Was Joseph Smith a great American prophet of God or a 19th century fraud? Be sure to use facts in your answer!
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I personally think that Joseph Smith is a PHONY! He does not make any sence and tells people what they want to hear. I read today that he also was dishonost which is a key factor in determining his innocense. He hid his 35 marriages from wife #1, which is the other book end for me, this means he can not be trusted.
ReplyDeleteI think Joseph Smith was a fraud. One thing that makes him a phony, is that he claimed he was given golden plates that were written in old hieroglyphics, which til this day haven't been connected to any known language. Smith supposedly translated these plates by using the reflection of "seer stones" in a hat. Smith would cover his whole face, blocking out the light, so there was no way possible for him to see the reflection. And seer stones, back in the day where use to trick the community into thinking that the person who sees into it knows where gold was secretly hidden, but in reality they just put the gold in the ground the night before. Another reason why I believe Joseph Smith was a fraud, because there was no Lost Israelites in North America during the time of Jesus, so it would make the Mormons sound crazy by believing that the Garden of Eden was in Jackson County, Missouri. They also believed they were equal to Jesus and God, by believing that they become the god of their own planet after they die. Another main reason was that when times got tough such as the bank going boom when they first began to grow, Joseph Smith ran into the night, leaving everyone behind and not claiming any responsibility. So, basically I believe Joseph Smith is a fraud and made up allegations in order to start his own religion.
ReplyDeleteJoseph Smith was known to be the great American prophet of God in the religion of Mormonism. I believe his teachings are fraud. It is said Joseph Smith had found a group of golden plates informed by the angel Moroni. He found those plates with an insignificant seer stone. Seer stones were known as folk magic that could perceive things unlike the naked eye. How could a mere stone possibly reveal the whereabouts of the Urim and Thummim plates? His preachings seem more like scam rather than a prophet.
ReplyDeleteI personally believe Joseph Smith was a fraud because the stories that he tells and that are told about him do not make much sense when you really think about them and the Book of Mormon had many plagiarisms from many different sources and if the book that your whole religion is about or based off of is a fake then so are you and your religion
ReplyDeleteI also believe Joseph Smith was a fraud. He hid having 35 wives from his first wife. How can anyone like that be trusted? He tells crazy story and makes up crazy rules that his followers need to obey. He told people he would find them treasure so the people trusted him and gave him the money but he never found the treasure and kept the peoples money. If that is not fraud I dont know what is!
ReplyDeleteI Think that Joseph Smith was a fraud because most of the time when he had a miraculous revelation it was for his own benefit. First with the seer stones he said he found the book of Mormon in some unknown Egyptian language, after he convinced people that the seer stones had some sort of power he would trick people to believe that he was finding gold. Then the concept of polygamy, Joseph said it was revealed to him by god but if he didn't do it he would be killed, i do not think God would threaten to kill anyone especially one of his prophets
ReplyDeleteAfter watching the video and researching some information about Joseph Smith, I believe he is a pretentious prophet. Critics believe that he plagiarized quotes while creating the Book of Mormons. Some verses Joseph copied came from these books: the View of the Hebrews, The Wonders of Nature, The Bible, and the Apocrypha. Nowadays plagiarism is a crime. Therefore, Joseph Smith is not only a fraud, but he is also a criminal. According to Bianca, he's also not a very good leader. Running away and not taking responsibility for his own irresponsible actions does not show how great a leader Joseph Smith was. After that incident, I wonder why his followers will still have faith in him. After watching the video I am even more convinced that Joseph Smith was fake. The critic explains how Joseph tricked his followers when translating the Book of Mormon. He used this method of "seeing through" seer stones to translate the book from Egyptian hieroglyphics to English. There is evidence that proves that this was not true. I am amazed how Mormons still believe in a man who would make up his own religion.
ReplyDeleteI believe that Joseph Smith was a fraud. He was really good scam artist. He was charming, charismatic, "good looking", and extremely likable. He coned people to believe what he wanted them to believe. Many of his stories and accounts of seeing "god" are hard to believe. He said that Jesus and God came to him in the woods and told him that everything that the church is teaching is wrong and the church is corrupted. This seems highly unlikely to ever happen. Another really strong reason why he seems like a con artist is because money is involved. He used seer stones to "find" gold and he got money and fame for these performances. He is also not the only person doing this at the time so technically hes not the only "prophet". Lastly he seems like a fraud because he practiced polygamy behind his wife's back so he was technically cheating on her. Good prophets should not cheat on their wives or want more then one wife. It is unethical and wrong. Its as if he treats women like things instead of people. He downgrades a woman's worth by letting men have more then one wife. I believe Joseph Smith was a fraud who started a cult but who is anybody to say that somebody is wrong or right. He might have been telling the truth. In some way Jesus did somewhat the same thing, performed miracles, had revelations about God, seemed to know more then everybody else, and was killed because of his faith his religion. Mabey in the end, Joseph Smith is the 21 century prophet.
ReplyDeleteI do feel that Joseph Smith was a fame-seeking man living in a crazed time period. During this time period, people were very superstitious and gullible. They often conjured up crazy ideas and concepts that were probably more due to boredom than they were due to "physic" abilities or powers. Seer stones are a great example of this. Mostly everyone during this time period found this material authentic because it was common. Nowadays, we could clearly deny any of these crazy ideas without realizing that we may have some odd beliefs that don't seem so odd simply because the majority of people also believe it.
ReplyDeleteJoseph Smith was teenager when he had his first vision. He could have easily been so influenced by the various supernatural beliefs that it provoked him to try and pass on his own little story. The concept of males inheriting their own planet is also quite of an imposing thought that further increases my suspicion.
He gradually embraced his leadership and abused his power, especially by secretly practicing polygamy. His appearance was even altered in photos and he became this nearly god-like figure towards the rest of the LDS. Joseph cherished this authority and took advantage of it. Instead of offering general advice and spurring the start of a healthy community, it seems as if Joseph was trying to create something more than that. He wanted to establish his own religion and twist around his faith entirely to do so. Like Naquan said, it seems as if his revelations were purely for his own benefit. I'm sure that initially, Joey had some good intentions and I think he gradually developed this ambition for higher status.
I, along with everyone else believe that Joseph Smith was a con artist of his time. He was a seemingly deceptive person that was known for the use of trickery and dishonesty. His utilization of seer stones is a great point of proving him to be a fraud. Many people in his time would use seer stones to claim that they know where gold has been buried or numerous other things. He basically used the “magical tricks” that many frauds in his time used and added a twist of religion to it. I wouldn’t expect anyone posting on the blog to believe that he was a true religious prophet of God.
ReplyDeleteI think that Joseph Smith was a fraud, rather than a prophet of God. Just as Mike said, his use of seer stones was probably a scam, as people used to "find" gold.
ReplyDeleteAlso, his visions that he had seen, could also just be lies. I don't know why anyone would want to lie about that, but I think he did. Like what Steven N said, he wanted to establish his own religion and twist around his faith.
Smith was just another con artist in the 19th century who wanted more than just money.
I think that Joseph Smith was just power hungry and came up with a scam, that seemed to work. Many people in his time were coming up with stories, and ways to make it seem that they are greater than everyone else. He told people about the visions he had, who noes if he was lying? No one else saw them. Also like a few other people said about the seer stones, many people in Josephs time used them to try to trick people that they could find gold with the power they had, or that they were led by God. Joseph Smith just was a good liar and achieved what he wanted, which was power over many people by claiming to be a prophet.
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ReplyDeleteJoseph Smith did a lot of things that proved to most people that he was indeed a con man. Before he made the Book of Mormon he pretended to be a seer who could find treasures in the ground. Obviously people would pay him money to find treasures because they believed he could actually find it. When he wasn’t able to find any gold he told the people that the treasure was guarded by spirits who moved the treasure through the ground to keep people from getting it. They arrested him as a “juggler” which means “con man”. Instead of putting him in jail they told him he could instead get out of town and never come back again. But there’s evidence to prove that if the judge didn’t decide that and let him leave town, he’d definitely be found guilty. Then after that, another scam came about when Smith fabricated the Book of Mormon which got ideas from many other literature works. When the church first started he made the new converts turn all of their property to him, so since that caused some problems he got people to start “tithing” (paying the church about 10%). When he was brought to court on March 20, 1826 he was accused of a few things as stated above and another was that: he would tell people he could see through a particular stone and read books through that stone, but the stone was white and transparent which made the people watching this “deception” disgusted. So everything he’s done does seem like whole one big scam to make money, and just goes to show what people will do for money.
ReplyDeleteI think that Joseph Smith is a fake because of many of his actions. He said that an angel named Moroni told him that their were buried golden plates. To locate these plates, Smith used seer stones in which they were created for profit and scams. He also wrote the Book of Mormon which has now been known to be plagiarized from the Bible, from Shakespeare, from the pope's Essays on Man, from the Westminster Confession of Faith, and from other leading authors of the last few hundred years prior to Smith's death. After constant migration after Mormons were getting kicked out, Smith then decides to become a military type leader and began to start having many more different wives.
ReplyDeleteNote: There should not be a "sign out" buttone so close to the "post comment" button. My second time typing this...
ReplyDeleteJoseph Smith seems like a complete fake. His entire religion feels like something that was just made up on the spot. Along with the natural uncredibility of his stories, he has been shown to be a habitual lier when he kept his poligamy from his wife. He was, as Nunes said, just a man seeking attention by trying to trick people. He was also very childish and would get angry whenever some information of him was puplicized. Just like many other people who try to gain religious support, he would say and do anything to win over support.
P.S. Steven, you mispelled psychic.
sorry for responding so late but my internet wasnt working yesterday. I think Joseph Smith was a con artist. He used seers stones to claim he had prophetic powers. He also had multiple accounts of the story in which he was visited by God and Jesus and they seemed to become more creative as time passed. I also think he was conning his wife when he became a polygamist.
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