"The gold plates which Joseph Smith allegedly received from an angel and translated with the use of a seer stone from "reformed Egyptian" to English which told of a group of Jews sailing to America in 600B.C. where they established a civilization and were known as "Nephites". The translation became entitled The Book Of Mormon. Truth: We have no testimony from anyone other than 11 mormons that the gold plates ever did exist, and they are nowhere to be seen now. He didn't translate to reformed Egyptian because no such language is known of by archaeologists. In direct contradiction to the bible, it states that Jesus was bom in Jerusalem (Alma 7:9-10) and not in Bethlehem (Micah 5:2, Matthew 2:1) and that the darkness after Jesus crucifixion lasted 3 days (Helaman 14:20) and not 3 hours (Matthew 27:45, Mark 15:33). Also there has not been found any archaeological evidence to validate the existence of the Nephite civilization that supposedly lasted 1000 years. Because of this obvious lack, some mormons grasp at straws and even claim that the ancient temples in the Yucatan peninsula were built by the Nephites even though archaeologists say that they were built around 1000 AD which is 600 years past the date of the end of the supposed Nephite civilization. John C. Sorenson, Chairman of Brigham Young University Anthropology Department describes some of the most popular books among Mormons on the subject of archaeology and geography as "naive", "harmful", and as "cut-and-paste.. efforts". He also said "There is plenty of evidence that the Latter Day Saints are gullible on many subjects, not just this one." ("Instant Expertise on Book of Mormon Archaeology" in BYU Studies Spring 1976 pp 429-432) Mormon archaeologist professor Dee F. Green said "The first myth we need to eliminate is that Book of Mormon archaeology exists" (Dialogue op. cit., Summer 1969 pp 77-78). Dr Richard Phales, author, lecturer, and archaeologist, said "We have never excavated one single artifact that even remotely relates to this alleged civilization that the Mormons claim existed in the U.S., Central America, and S. America" (video, The God Makers, 1982 Jerimiah Films). Allegedly two groups (numbering 3 and 8) of Mormons saw the gold plates. The first group of 3 were also the ones who ordained all of the first 12 apostles to the Mormon church. All 3 eventually renounced Mormonism and were called by Joseph Smith "too mean to mention; and we had liked to have forgotten them'' (Joseph Smith: History of the Church Vol 3 pg 232) and "liars, cheats, and blacklegs". Only 3 of the 11 stayed in Mormonism, all 3 being Smiths. Most of the 11 were known to be very unstable and unreliable, always having fantastic visions and jumping from one religion to another (The God Makers, Decker & Hunt p102). Also, the Book of Mormon suspiciously contains hundreds of quotations from the King James version of The Bible (and even whole chapters; compare Isaiah chapters 2-14 to 2 Nephi chapters12-24, Isa 48-49 to 1 Nephi 20-21, Isa 50-51 to 2 Nephi 7-8). The alleged prophet Nephi allegedly made the gold plates in 600-500 B.C. but the King James version wasn't published until 1611 AD. Either Nephi lacked enough to write about and so magically transported to the future to copy out of the bible, or Joseph Smith copied out of the King James Bible (which was available to him) in order to enhance his fictitious story with the words of true prophets in order to fool those who weren't familiar enough with their bible to know that it had been copied. J S made it very obvious that he did copy from the bible by keeping the same bible chapter divisions and verse numbers and also kept the same words italicized! J S was also found out to be a fraudulent "translator" of ancient manuscripts by 3 men in 1843 who brought to him six thin brass plates which they had made to look like ancient plates with phony hieroglyphics on them. J S began to "translate" them using his seer stone and said they "contain the history of the person with whom they were found. He was a descendant of Ham, through the loins of Pharaoh.'' After the death of J S the 3 men made public the hoax which was then confirmed by experts. University of Chicago professor James Breasted wrote: "The Kinderhook plates are, of course, childish forgeries, as the scientific world has known for years. ... Where we can check up on Smith as a translator of plates, he is found guilty of deception. How can we trust him with reference to his claims about the Book Of Mormon?"
