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Golden plates

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An 1893 engraving of Joseph Smith receiving the Golden Plates and the Urim and Thummim from Moroni. The sword of Laban is shown nearby.

LDS Standard Works

The Golden Plates, also called the Gold Plates or the Golden Bible,[1] were a book of engraved metallic leaves that Joseph Smith, Jr. said was the source for his 1829 Book of Mormon, a scripture of the Latter Day Saint movement. Smith, the founder of that movement, said he obtained the plates on September 22 1827 in a hill in Manchester, New York.

Smith said the Golden Plates had been engraved by a pre-Columbian prophet-warrior named Mormon and his son Moroni, who wrote in a language Smith called reformed Egyptian. Smith said that the Book of Mormon included only a fraction of what had been written on the plates, because the rest were sealed and could not be opened. Twelve witnesses, including Smith, claimed to have seen the plates. Smith said he returned the plates to Moroni in 1829, and they were not seen thereafter.

Physical description of the Golden Plates

Appearance

Full-scale model of the Golden Plates based on Joseph Smith's description.

In a letter of 1842, Smith said that the "plates...had the appearance of gold, each plate was six inches [150 mm] wide and eight inches [200 mm] long, and not quite so thick as common tin. They were filled with engravings, in Egyptian characters, and bound together in a volume, as the leaves of a book, with three rings running through the whole. The volume was something near six inches [150 mm] in thickness, a part of which was sealed. The characters on the unsealed part were small, and beautifully engraved. The whole book exhibited many marks of antiquity in its construction, and much skill in the art of engraving." [2]

According to Joseph Smith and others, a portion of the golden plates were "sealed." This "sealing" may refer to a mystical seal like those mentioned in other Mormon scriptures and in the biblical book of Revelation. [3] More than fifty years later, however, David Whitmer, who claimed to have seen the plates in 1829, said that about half the book was physically sealed, "so securely bound that it was impossible to separate them...as solid to my view as wood."[4]

Weight and composition

Because the plates were never weighed or measured, their precise weight and composition remain unknown. Joseph Smith's brother, William, said that he "was permitted to lift [the plates] as they laid in a pillow-case; but not to see them, as it was contrary to the commands he had received. They weighed about sixty pounds according to the best of my judgment." [5] Others who lifted the plates while they were wrapped in cloth or enclosed in a box agreed that they weighed about sixty pounds, although Martin Harris said that he had "hefted the plates many times, and should think they weighed forty or fifty pounds." [6] Had the plates been made of 24-karat gold (which Smith never claimed), they would have weighed about 140 pounds. [7]

The plates might have been made from tin or various copper alloys. Plates with similar dimensions to those described by Smith might have weighed about 50 pounds if made of tin, which was readily available in the Palmyra area. [8] If made of copper, the plates would have weighed about 65 pounds, or if of a mixture of gold and copper or copper plated with gold, between 65 and 140 pounds. [9]. Plates made of tumbaga, the name given by the Spanish to an alloy of gold and copper would have weighed between 53 and 86 pounds.[10]

Story of the plates

Obtaining the plates

In the 1820s, Joseph Smith, Jr. lived with his parents Joseph Sr. and Lucy Mack Smith on a farm at the edge of Manchester Township near Palmyra, New York. There he worked at various farm-related jobs while using folk magic to search for buried treasure.[11] Smith said that on the night of September 21, 1823, he received three visitations from an angel named Moroni. The angel told Smith that a record on gold plates was deposited in a prominent hill about three miles from Smith's home and that Smith would one day receive the plates and translate them.[12] On September 22, 1823, a day listed in local almanacs as the autumnal equinox,[13] Smith said that he visited the hill and found the the artifacts inside a stone box. [14]

An 1841 engraving of "Mormon Hill" (looking south), where Smith said he found the Golden Plates on the west side, near the peak.

Nevertheless, the angel told him that "the time for bringing them forth had not yet arrived," that he should return to the site annually on the same day until the proper time had come.[15] Smith said that he visited the hill each year but was forbidden to take the plates until September 22, 1827.[16] Smith said that the angel had kept the plates from him earlier because he "had saught the Plates to obtain riches"—perhaps a reference to his continued money-digging activities. (Smith was convicted of disturbing the peace as a "glass looker" in March 1826.)[17]Shortly after Smith told his family about the plates, rumors of them began circulating in the Palmyra area, especially among those who had been associated with Smith in his treasure hunting activities.[18]

File:Josephreceivingtheplatesccachristensen.gif
A 19th century painting by C.C.A. Christensen, showing Joseph Smith, Jr. kneeling while receiving the golden plates from a standing or floating Moroni.

Shortly after he retrieved the plates from the Hill Cumorah, Smith claimed to have escaped from unknown assailants. Smith said he had wrapped the plates in his frock and started for home with them "under his arm," when he was chased through the woods by a man who gave him a "heavy blow with a gun." Knocking the man down with a single punch, Smith ran "at the top of his speed" for a half mile and was assaulted in the same manner two more times before arriving safely, suffering only a dislocated thumb.[19]

Several of Smith's neighbors made attempts to find and seize the plates, and Smith claimed to have moved them from place to place to keep them from being discovered.[20] Smith said that he had at first kept the plates in a chest under the hearth in his parents' home, then under the floor boards of his parents' previous log home nearby, and finally in a barrel of flax shortly before the chest was discovered and the place ransacked.[21]

Transcription of the plates

With some financial assistance from a prominent, though superstitious, local landowner Martin Harris,[22] Smith and his wife Emma moved to Harmony, Pennsylvania, Emma's home town, in early October 1827, with the golden plates reportedly hidden for the trip in a barrel of beans. [23] In Harmony, Joseph and Emma stayed for a time in the home of Emma's father Isaac Hale, but when Smith refused to show Hale the plates, Hale banished the concealed object from his house.[24]

Smith claimed that he copied characters from the golden plates and translated them by using "Urim and Thummim," the "interpreters" that he had also found with the plates in the hill; but there is no independent witness to this procedure.[25] Quickly Smith abandoned the Urim and Thummim and returned to the seer stone that he had previously used for treasure hunting. Emma Smith later recalled that when she took dictation from her husband, she "frequently wrote day after day, often sitting at the table close by him, he sitting with his face buried in his hat, with the stone in it, and dictating hour after hour with nothing between us.... The plates often lay on the table without any attempt at concealment, wrapped in a small linen table cloth, which I had given him to fold them in. I once felt of the plates as they thus lay on the table tracing their outline and shape. They seemed to be pliable like thick paper, and would rustle with a metallic sound when the edges were moved by the thumb, as one does sometimes thumb the edges of a book."[26]

Usually, however, the golden plates were not even in the same room. Michael Morse, Smith's brother-in-law, said that he watched Smith on several occasions:"The mode of procedure consisted in Joseph's placing the Seer Stone in the crown of a hat, then putting his face into the hat, so as to entirely cover his face." David Whitmer said that "the plates were not before Joseph while he translated, but seem to have been removed by the custodian angel." Isaac Hale said that while Joseph was translating, the plates were "hid in the woods." Joseph Smith, Sr. said they were "hid in the moutains."[27] During the translation process a curtain or blanket was placed between Smith and his scribe or between the living area and the area where Smith and his scribe worked. [28] Sometimes Smith dictated to Martin Harris from upstairs or from a different room. [29]

Smith used a number of assistants during the process of transcribing The Book of Mormon, including Emma Smith, Martin Harris, and most notably, Oliver Cowdery. Nevertheless, Smith's "translation" process did not involve his understanding of an ancient script. As he looked into the seer stone, the words of the text appeared to him in English. When in mid-1828, Smith loaned the manuscript pages to Martin Harris, and Harris lost them, Smith said that opponents would try to see if he could "bring forth the same words again." Smith did not explain why he believed different translations of a text should not be different or why a fraudulent version with different handwriting would not be obvious.[30]

Shortly after baptizing each other in the Susquehanna River and experiencing a vision of John the Baptist, Smith and Cowdery moved on to the farm of the Whitmers, a family of supporters in Fayette, New York. Rather than hide the Golden Plates for this trip, Smith gave them over to an angel for safekeeping until they had completed their journey.[31]

Witnesses

Main articles: Three Witnesses and Eight Witnesses

As Smith finished the translation of the plates, he revealed that witnesses would be asked to testify to their existence. In June 1829, two sets of witnesses (the Three Witnesses[32]and a separate group of Eight Witnesses[33]) signed joint statements, written by Smith, which were subsequently published with the text of the Book of Mormon.[34] The Three Witnesses — Oliver Cowdery, David Whitmer, and Martin Harris — affirmed that an angel had descended from heaven and presented the plates, which they saw but did not touch. Then they heard a voice from heaven declaring that the book was translated by the power of God and that they should bear record of it. The Eight Witnesses were members of the Joseph Smith and David Whitmer families. Like the Three Witnesses, the Eight signed a joint statement that they had seen and (in their case) hefted the plates. [35]

Plates returned to Moroni

Once the translation was complete, about July 1829, Smith said that he returned the plates to the to the angel.[36] Many Latter Day Saints, including Brigham Young, have believed the plates were returned to Hill Cumorah and that other ancient records lie buried there, including the Sword of Laban and the special spectacles given to aid the translation process.[37]

Other metal plates mentioned in the Book of Mormon

In addition to the Golden Plates, the Book of Mormon refers to several other sets of books written on metal plates:

Other metal plates in the Latter Day Saint Tradition

  • In 1843, Smith acquired a set of six small bell-shaped plates, known as the Kinderhook Plates, found in Kinderhook, Pike County, Illinois. Joseph said that they contained information about a descendant of Ham "through the loins of Pharaoh" but never produced a translation. After Smith's assassination, the Kinderhook Plates were presumed lost, but for decades The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints published facsimiles of them in its official History of the Church as evidence that ancient Americans wrote on metal plates. In 1980 the Kinderhook Plates were proved to have been manufactured in the nineteenth century, probably in an attempt to catch Smith in a fraud. Today the LDS Church acknowledges the plates as a hoax and makes no attempt to defend their authenticity.[38]
  • James J. Strang, one of the rival claimants to succeed Smith, also claimed to have discovered and translated a set of plates known as the Voree Plates. Strang likewise produced witnesses to their authenticity. Although Strang's movement was short-lived, Joseph Smith's mother, Lucy Mack Smith, and all living witnesses to the Book of Mormon, including the three Whitmers and Martin Harris (although perhaps excluding Oliver Cowdery), accepted "Strang's leadership, angelic call, metal plates, and his translation of these plates as authentic."[39]

Metal plates outside the Latter Day Saint tradition

Some ancient European and Mesopotamian cultures kept short records on metal plates. Those found to date have been extremely thin to facilitate being engraved with a pointed tool. In 500 BCE, Darius the Great of Persia inscribed a history on a gold plate and sealed it in a stone box in the temple at Persepolis. [40]. A six-page gold book, written in Etruscan, was found in Bulgaria;[41]and in 2005, an eight-page golden codex, allegedly from the Achaemenid period, was recovered from smugglers by the Iranian police.[42] The Pyrgi Tablets (now at the National Etruscan Museum, Rome) are gold plates with a bilingual Phoenician-Etruscan text. Among the Dead Sea Scrolls is a Copper Scroll (which seems to be a list of treasure locations). Gold Laminae funerary texts similar to Books of the Dead have also been found in Italy. Legendary gold, silver, copper and brass books are also discussed in Masonic Hiram Abif and Enoch legends. According to an LDS publication, in the early 1950s, American archaeologist and oil promoter Wendell Phillips discovered several engraved bronze plates at Khor Rori on the Arabian peninsula where most LDS scholars believe that Nephi built his ship to sail to the Americas. [43] Nevertheless, the longest extant ancient record written on metal plates is only eight pages.[citation needed]

Notes

  1. ^ Use of the terms Golden Bible and Gold Bible by believers and non-believers dates from the late 1820s. See, for instance, Tiffany 1859, p. 167 (use of the term Gold Bible by Martin Harris in 1827); Smith 1853, pp. 102, 109, 113, 145 (use of the term gold Bible in 1827–29 by believing Palmyra neighbors); Grandin 1829 (stating that by 1829 the plates were "generally known and spoken of as the 'Golden Bible'"). Use of these terms has been rare, especially by believers, since the 1830s.
  2. ^ (Smith 1842).
  3. ^ (Smith 1842, p. 707). Accounts differ as to the nature of this "sealing". The Book of Mormon itself refers to a vision of a prophet referred to as the brother of Jared that was written and "sealed", but the term "sealed" is also applied to the interpreters Smith said were buried with the plates and protected by the angel (Ether 4:5). The entire plates were said to have been "sealed up, and hid up unto the Lord" (Smith 1830, title page). The book also refers to lost writings of John the Apostle that were written and "sealed up to come forth in their purity" in the end times (1 Nephi 14:26). One of the very last sections of the Book of Mormon to be translated indicates that the plates were "sealed by the power of God" (2 Nephi 27:10). This and the historical context have led some commentators to suggest the sealing Smith refers to is a magic seal, rather than a physical seal (Quinn 1998, p. 195–196).
  4. ^ (Whitmer 1888) (Poulson 1878). In 1840, Orson Pratt, an associate of Smith's who never claimed to have seen the plates, stated that two-thirds of the plates contained a physical seal that Smith "was commanded not to break." Orson Pratt, Journal of Discourses, 3:347, 13 April 1856; Ibid., 19:211–12, 9 December 1877.
  5. ^ (Smith 1883)
  6. ^ (Tiffany 1859, pp. 166, 169).
  7. ^ (Vogel 2004, p. 600, n. 65).
  8. ^ (Vogel 2004, p. 600, n. 65); (Vogel 2004, p. 98).
  9. ^ (Vogel 2004, p. 600, n. 65)
  10. ^ "Were the Plates of Mormon of Tumbaga?" Improvement Era(September 1966), 788–89, 828–31; also in Ross T. Christensen, ed., Papers of the Fifteenth Annual Symposium on the Archaeology of the Scriptures (Provo, Utah: Extension Publications, BYU Division of Continuing Education, 1964), 101–9. Putnam's findings are summarized in "The 'Golden' Plates," in John W. Welch, ed., Reexploring the Book of Mormon (Salt Lake City: Deseret Book and FARMS, 1992), 275–77
  11. ^ Richard Lyman Bushman, Joseph Smith: Rough Stone Rolling (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 2005), 50-51, 54-55: "The Smiths were as susceptible as their neighbors to treasure-seeking folklore.…Joseph, Jr. never repudiated the stones or denied their power to find treasure. Remnants of the magical culture stayed with him to the end."
  12. ^ "Joseph Smith History, 1839," in EMD 1: 63-65.
  13. ^ "The angel had appeared on the night of the Autumnal equinox, between midnight and dawn—hours auspicious for a magical invocation. On the day of the equinox Joseph had subsequently made his four annual visits to the hill. When finally he retrieved the plates, it was the eve of the equinox, in the first hour after midnight. Accounts suggested he had been required to take with him that night a consort (his wife), to ride a black horse, and to dress in black—all lending a further magical tenor to the operation." Lance S. Owens, "Joseph Smith: America's Hermetic Prophet," Gnosis: A Journal of Western Inner Traditions, (Spring 1995).
  14. ^ According to Smith's account, "the vision (of the hill) was opened to my mind that I could see the place where the plates were deposited, and that so clearly and distinctly that I knew the place again when I visited it." (JS-History 1:42). This conforms to an account by Smith's friend Joseph Knight, Sr. Joseph Knight, Sr. Reminiscence, c. 1835-47 in EMD, 4: 15. However, according to an account by Martin Harris, Smith discovered the location of the Golden Plates through the use of the seer stone he had used to seek treasure as part of the Stowell-Hale team in 1825 (Martin Harris interview with Joel Tiffany, 1859. EMD, 2: 303-04).
  15. ^ JS-History 1:53. Smith was also told not to show the plates "to any person." JS-History 1:42.
  16. ^ There is no corroborating evidence that Smith actually visited the hill before 1827.
  17. ^ Joseph Smith, "Joseph Smith History, 1832, Early Mormon Documents, I, 29-30; John L. Brooke, The Refiner's Fire: The Making of the Mormon Cosmology, 1644-1844 (Cambridge University Press, 1994), 154.
  18. ^ Dan Vogel, Joseph Smith: The Making of a Prophet (Salt Lake City: Signature Books, 2004), 99-101; Bushman, 59: "Joseph foresaw the possibility that Samuel Lawrence, a neighbor who searched for treasure with the Smiths, would try to interfere.…As Joseph's former partners, the treasure-seekers thought the plates were partly theirs."
  19. ^ Lucy Smith, "Preliminary Manuscript," LDS Church Archives, Salt Lake City, Utah, in Dan Vogel, Early Mormon Documents (Salt Lake City: Signature Books, 1996), I, 335-36.
  20. ^ Bushman, 61.
  21. ^ (Tiffany 1859) (Smith 1853, pp. 107–109)
  22. ^ The local Presbyterian minister, Jesse Townsend, described Harris as a "visonary fanatic." A acquaintance, Lorenzo Saunders, said "There can't anybody say word against Martin Harris...a man that would do just as he agreed with you. But he was a great man for seeing spooks." Quoted in "Ronald W. Walker, "Martin Harris: Mormonism's Early Convert," Dialogue: A Journal of Mormon Thought, 19 (Winter 1986): 34-35.
  23. ^ (Smith 1853, p. 113)(Tiffany 1859, p. 170)
  24. ^ (Howe 1834, p. 264); (Howe 1834, p. 264); (Jesee 1976, p. 3)
  25. ^ Joseph Smith-History 1:62
  26. ^ Grant Palmer, An Insider's View of Mormon Origins (Salt Lake City: Signature Books, 2002), 2-3.
  27. ^ Grant H. Palmer, An Insider's View of Mormon Origins (Salt Lake City: Signature Books, 2002), 2-5. In March 1829, Martin Harris returned to Harmony and asked to see the plates. Smith reportedly told Harris that Smith "would go into the woods where the Book of Plates was, and that after he came back, Harris should follow his tracks in the snow, and find the Book, and examine it for himself"; after following these directions, however, Harris could not find the plates (Howe 1834, pp. 264–265).
  28. ^ Lyndon W. Cook, David Whitmer Interviews: A Restoration Witness (Orem, UT: Grandin, 1991), 173; Palmer, 2-3.
  29. ^ (Howe 1834, p. 14)
  30. ^ D&C 10: 17-18, 31. Smith seems to have assumed that a second transcription of the missing 116 pages should be identical to the first rather than be filled with the natural variants that would occur if one was translating, and not merely transcribing, a text from one language into another.Palmer, 7.
  31. ^ Bushman, 74-76; (Smith 1853, p. 137).
  32. ^ The Three Witnesses were selected soon after a visit by Martin Harris to the Whitmer home in Fayette, accompanied by Smith's parents (Smith 1853, p. 138), to inquire about the translation (Roberts 1902, p. 51). According to Smith's mother, this trip was prompted by news that Smith had completed the translation of the plates(Smith 1853, p. 138). When Harris he arrived, he joined with Oliver Cowdery and David Whitmer to request that the three be named as the Three Witnesses referred to in the much earlier revelation directed to Harris, and also referred to in a recently-translated portion of the plates called the Book of Ether (2:2–4) (Roberts 1902, p. 51). In response, Smith dictated a revelation that the three of them would see the Golden Plates (Roberts 1902, pp. 51–53). Thus, Smith took the three of them to the woods near the Whitmer home and they had a shared vision in which they all claimed to see (with their "spiritual eyes", Harris reportedly said (Gilbert 1892)) an angel holding the Golden Plates and turning its leaves (Roberts 1902, pp. 54–55; Smith 1830b, appendix). The four of them also said they heard "the voice of the Lord" telling them that the translation of the plates was correct, and commanding them to testify of what they saw and heard (Roberts 1902, pp. 54–55; Smith 1830b, appendix).David Whitmer later stated that the angel showed them "the breast plates, the Ball or Directors, the Sword of Laban and other plates" (Van Horn 1881; Kelley & Blakeslee 1882; see also Smith 1835, p. 171).
  33. ^ The Eight Witnesses were selected a few days later when Smith traveled to Palmyra with the males of the Whitmer home, including David Whitmer's father Peter, his brothers Christian, Jacob, and John, and his brother-in-law Hiram Page. Smith took this group, along with his father Joseph Smith, Sr. and his brothers Hyrum and Samuel to a location near Smith's parent's home in Palmyra (Smith 1853). Because of a foreclosure on their Manchester property, the Smith family was then living in a log cabin technically in Palmyra (Smith 1883, p. 14; Berge 1985) where Smith said he showed them the Golden Plates (Roberts 1902, p. 57). Like the Three Witnesses, the Eight Witnesses later signed an affidavit for inclusion at the end of the Book of Mormon (Smith, 1830b & appendix). Though the Eight Witnesses did not refer, like the Three, to an angel or the voice of God, they said that they had hefted the plates and seen the engravings on them (Smith, 1830b & appendix).
  34. ^ Bushman, 76-79. A comparison of "The Testimony of Three Witnesses" to Doctrine and Covenants 17, written in 1829, shows "the marks of common authorship." Grant Palmer, An Insider's View of Mormon Origins (Salt Lake City: Signature Books, 2002), 195-96.See Oliver Cowdery to Hyrum Smith dated June 14 1829, quoting the language of this revelation. Joseph Smith letterbook (22 Nov. 1835 to 4 Aug. 1835), 5-6. Commentators generally agree that this letter refers to the revelation. See Larry C. Porter, "Dating the Restoration of the Melchizedek Priesthood," Ensign (June 1979), 5. A revelation by Smith commanded Cowdery and Whitmer to seek out twelve "disciples", who desired to serve, and who would "go into all the world to preach my gospel unto every creature", and who would be ordained to baptize and to ordain priests and teachers (Phelps 1833, p. 37). Soon thereafter in the second half of June 1829 (Van Horn 1881), a group of Three Witnesses and a separate group of Eight Witnesses were selected, in addition to Smith himself, to testify that Smith had the Golden Plates.
  35. ^ "The translator of this work, has shown unto us the plates of which hath been spoken, which have the appearance of gold; and as many of the leaves as the said Smith has translated we did handle with our hands; and we also saw the engravings thereon, all of which has the appearance of ancient work, and of curious workmanship."
  36. ^ (Van Horn 1881);(Smith 1853, p. 141.)
  37. ^ Journal of Discourses 19: 38, July 17, 1877. According to Oliver Cowdery's account, when the angel instructed Smith to return the plates to the hill Cumorah, Oliver Cowdery accompanied him. The hill opened and they walked into a cave where there was a spacious room with wagon loads of metallic plates and the Sword of Laban, unsheathed on a large table. Joseph and Oliver placed the plates on this table.
  38. ^ Richard Bushman, Joseph Smith: Rough Stone Rolling (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 2005), 489-90.
  39. ^ Palmer, 208-13. Cowdery's father converted to Strang's movement in the summer of 1846, and a year later Oliver Cowdery was living in Elkhorn, Wisconsin, twelve miles from Strang's headquarters and was associated in some way with his church. Stanley R. Gunn, Oliver Cowdery: Second Elder and Scribe (Salt Lake City: Bookcraft, 1962), 189.
  40. ^ [1], [2]
  41. ^ BBC news report
  42. ^ Circle of Ancient Iranian Studies website
  43. ^ See the Nephi Project paper on the topic. An image engraved on the plate shown in the paper bears a striking resemblence to sacred rites performed in Mormon temples as well as to rites in ancient Mesopotamian paganism. Nephi and his family may have taught the gospel to people in this and other locations during their eight year migration (see D&C 33:7-8) and may have in turn learned plate-making metalugy from them.

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