Mormon 9

Note Mormon is equating the words fair, and white with pure and spotless.

It is interesting to note that the gifts spoken of here were very much a part of the early LDS Church, with frequent experiences described as very similar to Biblical examples of these gifts. However, the current state of the Church does not seem to have these gifts in the same way. For example, the gift of tongues in both the Bible and in the early LDS Church is described as an experience in which a person spoke a foreign language they had no understanding of. In the LDS Church today, the gift of tongues is the label given to an experience where a missionary or Church leader says something in a language they have been studying extensively, but that they didn’t think they had the ability to express in the well-studied language. Given the fact that some missionaries think they speak their mission language well when they actually don’t speak it well, one wonders whether there is also some confirmation bias in effect, as in: Missionary: Coma estar ustad? (slaughtered Spanish greeting) Investigator: Hola amigo (responding politely while thinking: “What did he just say?”) Missionary: Thinking to self, “Wow! They understood me. I have the gift of tongues!” (See also 3 Nephi 29:6-7)

This seems to be directed to those who still believe in God, but think his miracles have ceased for some reason. It would seem odd for someone to believe in an all-powerful, unchanging God to think miracles used to take place, but now they don’t.

But many make a more consistent conclusion—that since there is no evidence of miracles now, the reports of such form the past are suspect.

The Book of Mormon reports many miracles of such a grand scale that large groups of people (see 3 Ne 11 ) or even all the people in the land (see 3 Nephi 19:35-36) witness the miracles. As a devout member of the Church over the course of 24 years, I never witnessed anything even remotely similar. Everything that I might have attributed to miraculous power back then seems to also happen spontaneously or through the actions of people whether faith is practiced or not, whether the outcome is even asked for or not.

This very book gives many examples of a God intervening on behalf of the innocent. Many modern believers even think He can intercede in things as inconsequential as finding lost keys, but there’s a little starving child right now, suffering horrific and humiliating indignities, who will receive no help from God, and will die shortly. Considering that some little children are brutalized and then die for no purpose whatsoever, I find it impossible to see marvelous things being wrought by God.

This verse gives a possible reason for the apparent change in the magnitude and scope of miracles I mentioned in my comment for verse 15. So if the miracles have diminished among the devout believers of today contrasted to the time of the founding of the LDS Church or contrasted to Book of Mormon times, are we to believe that God’s chosen people, the Mormons, dwindle in unbelief, and depart from the right way, and know not the God in whom they should trust? Why is there no glossolalia (speaking in a language unknown to humankind) or xenoglossia (speaking in a tongue known by others but not known by the speaker) in the Church today? Why are mortality rates for diagnosed injuries and diseases pretty much the same between the Saints and the rest of the population? Why are the lame not made to walk and the blind not made to see, except sometimes through modern medical procedures? I think the Saints are in general wonderful people. I do not fault them for the lack of miracles had among them.

Mormon 9:22-24

The words in bold here are found verbatim in Mark 16:15-18, KJV. The problem is, “Virtually all scholars believe that Mark 16:9–20 was not originally part of the Gospel” according to Julie M. Smith in BYU’s New Testament Commentary “The Ending of Mark’s Gospel”.

This whole chapter seems to be an appeal to fear. This feeds into the bias to want to believe (see Alma 32:27), the key to motivated reasoning, which leads people to believe all sorts of contradictory claims that are completely unsupported by any evidence whatsoever.

The phrase "consume it upon" occurs only once in the KJV bible, in James 4:3. The entire phrase “that ye may consume it upon your lusts” is found in both Mormon 9:28 and James 4:3 with the only difference being that in Mormon the “upon” is changed to “on.” The phrase "consume it on" does not exist in the KJV bible. Note that this verse also includes “ask” and “not” although they are separated by a few words.

The phrase "true God" is found in 5 instances within the KJV bible. Only Jeremiah 10:10 and 1 Thessalonians 1:9 also contain the word “living.” Yet only 1 Thessalonians 1:9 contains “true” and “living” within close proximity. It also contains the verb “serve.” It is obvious that the complete phrase “serve the true and living God” in Mormon 9:28 is merely restating the phrase “serve the living and true God” in 1 Thessalonians 1:9 with the adjectives transposed.

It is strange that Moroni uses these highly similar phrases that were written in Greek after Jesus' mortal ministry even though they were separated by an ocean and writing in different languages.

Mormon 9:32-33

Moroni tells us he and others have written this record in reformed Egyptian, and that they had also a reformed version of Hebrew. It’s about 1,000 years since Lehi and his group came to the Americas, all the while teaching each other and writing in reformed Egyptian and Hebrew, yet no pre-Columbian written record in a language related to Egyptian or Hebrew exists.