The 4th Nephite

@dominicptaranto Critics are always like “man it’s crazy, I’ve determined their religion is wrong and they still believe it - how can everyone be so stupid?!” Dawg intellectual honesty requires humility, rationality, and the ability to make concessions. That doesn’t *seem like it’s you.

I’ve never come across intellectually honest Mormon apologists. Probably because their religion is so insane that the second they become intellectually honest they leave it.

@ion_eyes It’s not because they don’t get it, it’s because it doesn’t make sense. Because most people use being and person as synonyms. Only Trinitarians make a distinction. And that distinction is confusing, not scientific, not biblical, and often punted as mysterious or divine logic.

Nearly every time I've asked LDS to explain to me what the doctrine of the Trinity is since they claim to deny it, they inevitably describe it as "Jesus prays to himself" or some other variation of Sabellianism/modalism (not the Trinity) Meanwhile, most Christians, while they can't explain all the intricacies of the Chalcedonian definition of the Trinity, can explain they worship only 1 God in 3 persons

@emuse1955 This guy literally has been insulting people all week on twitter while claiming victim. Then makes up quotes and distorts facts to try and make people believe him. Maybe the biggest hypocrite i’ve seen in this space.

@emuse1955 These 2 tweets perfectly represent your position. You say “Literally spent 30 mins” when it was 5. Like when you say “undisputed historical facts” - you are twisting words. And then you use a fake quote you know people wont fact check. Just like you did in your argument! Amazing

@ybobbjr You right, of course. Dem boys have a hard time not quibbling.

My opinion doesn’t matter, but I think we as Latter Day Saints should try and build as many bridges as we can with other denominations on this app Disregard what they think we believe, disregard if they label us a cult, disregard if they label us as Christians, disregard the hate, disregard it all. Respond with verses, respond with humor, respond with lightheartedness. Don’t let it get to you Millions shall know Brother Joseph again

@UserO010 @LadyDemosthenes Right. But to say it’s created from nothing is inaccurate. It just means to create and you’re correct its divine creation. We do not need to inject any presuppositions into it, especially anachronistic ones that run contrary to ancient near east thought.

@4th_nephite @LadyDemosthenes Bara/beta is only ever attributed to YHWH in the Bible. It is a divine creation. So, when David is asking for a new pure heart, it is because he cannot do so, nor can any other earthly creature. A sinless heart WAS created divinely generations later - and only by YHWH.

This person shared this definition to “prove” that this word in Hebrew DO NOT mean to create something out of nothing… I read it multiple times, just to make sure I wasn’t having a stroke, and highlighted how it specifically SUPPORTS creating something out of nothing. And this quoted tweet is her response. Am I having a stroke? Again, this highlighted definition was the source SHE gave me!

@SierraSamIV @grok @KimPalm97152207 @realDrTT Grok is saying what any LDS would say you just don’t like the answers lol

@grok @KimPalm97152207 @realDrTT So vast empires of missing Israelite tribes with pre-Colombian steel and chariots is canon? Incorrectly translated papyrus (aka Book of Abraham) is canon?

Okay, so here's the thing. If you're going to say that LDS worships a different Jesus, then you're going to have to explain how there were two Jesus' born in Bethlehem, ministered with the same exact words, were both crucified and died, were both raised from the dead. That, or you have to admit, that we have a different understanding of the same person.

@emuse1955 @CapturingChrist @TradVat2 Dawg do you know what undeniable historical facts are? Literally every single one of these points are contested by historians. You are smarter than this. This is like determining if the Bible is true by reading exclusively Bart Ehrman.

Reviewing my Mormonism debate on @CapturingChrist with @TradVat2 tonight at 8PM EST. youtube.com/watch?v=eI8hl7… Just a reminder that these are *undeniable historical facts* about the foundational prophet of Mormonism: --He was a prominent diviner and necromancer whose main source of income was hunting for treasure with the seer stones that he later used to 'translate' the Book of Mormon throughout the entire period when he later claimed that he experienced the series of apparitions upon which Mormonism was based. --The consensus among Joseph's neighbors was that Joseph and his relatives were unscrupulous, disreputable, and dishonest - and that they had told lots of contradictory stories about the discovery of the golden plates. There is early, directly and indirectly corroborated, sworn testimony that he communicated with evil spirits using the stones, that he offered animal sacrifices to appease evil spirits in failed attempts to gain access to hidden treasure using the stones, etc... --Joseph Smith was arrested for his money-digging activity. The defense that he - along with friendly witnesses that testified in his defense - offered during a preliminary hearing was that Joseph *really did have magical abilities.* And he described experiences that *could not possibly be explained by a sincere mistake or genuine confusion* but are either lies, borderline psychosis, or genuinely paranormal events. --On the evening when he later claimed that he encountered the angel Moroni, Mormon friendly witnesses confirm that he had just gotten back from an unsuccessful treasure quest. Numerous, converging lines of historical evidence indicate that the *original account* he gave of the discovery of the plates involved *an evil treasure guardian* rather than a prophetic calling and an interaction with an angel and that his later accounts *gradually developed over time to include more and more religious content and to strip away the occult context.* These golden plates were supposedly the source text for the Book of Mormon. --According to Mormon friendly sources, when Mormon missionaries brought the 'Gospel' to Kirtland, a demon rampage broke out among the early Mormons and they began to engage in bizarre and erratic behavior due to demonic influence. Then, when Joseph came and tried to institute authorities to manage the demon rampage, he laid hands on a guy to ordain him as a high priest, the guy he was trying to ordain was instantly demon possessed and began convulsing. Then the demon took turns possessing everybody in the room all day and for the greater part of the night. --Throughout each phase of Joseph's prophetic ministry, basically every high-ranking member of his Church was possessed by a demon and/or deceived by a demon into promulgating false revelations in the name of God, including Joseph himself. This despite the fact that these high-ranking members claimed powers of discernment and spiritual authority over demons that were totally inconsistent with these episodes - and even several episodes contradicting authoritative revelations promulgated by Smith in canonized LDS 'Scripture.' --In the final weeks of his life, Joseph was indicted for the sex crimes of adultery and fornication. Joseph vigorously maintained his innocence until his dying breath. Even conservative LDS historians now concede that he was objectively guilty of these sex crimes since they were defined by reference to legal marriage. Two weeks after his indictment, he would incite the destruction of a printing press that told the truth about his sexual misconduct. Two weeks after that, he died in a shootout in Carthage Jail while awaiting trial.

@emuse1955 Ethan is very smart. Very “classical debate” trained. But his hubris means when something reads true to him, it *must be true because *he reads it that way, and *he’s the smartest in the room. Richard Dawkins does something similar. Overconfidence in faulty assumptions.

@emuse1955 When you win a debate, you defends your proposition. Not reframe it into something smaller afterward. Yet another borrowing of the Bible’s possibility texts (Satan as an angel of light) while refusing its evaluation texts (the fruits, the confession, the invitation to do good)

The whole point of the debate prompt was to demonstrate the following: (1) Mormon can only escape the conclusion that their book is more likely demonic than divine by *rejecting* Joseph Smith's teaching on spiritual discernment. But it makes no sense for them to reject that teaching because (i) Joseph Smith claimed to have supernatural insight into how demons worked, (ii) Joseph Smith identified *specific individuals* that he says *had a false spirit* and then did all the things that Mormons are claiming that demons wouldn't do, (iii) the principle I'm invoking has been reaffirmed by the highest authorities in their Church over and over again. That is a DISASTER for them because it shows their system is self-defeating. It is fine by me if you think the BoM was natural rather than demonic. That wasn't the point of the debate topic - the point was to show there is a massive inconsistency at the heart of Mormon epistemology for reasoning about demons. (2) If you don't presuppose Mormonism and evaluate both pro-Mormon and anti-Mormon sources critically, you arrive at the conclusion that Smith's official histories are *embellishments* and that the religious content of his narratives of the discovery of the plates are anachronisms. The historical evidence indicates that his narrative began as *money-digging yarn* that involved an encounter with an *evil spirit* rather than a prophetic calling and an angel of the Lord. Thus, if Smith himself originally said he got the book from a demon but then falsified the story later, obviously it is way more likely that it was demonic than divine, regardless of your opinion about the probability of demons. (3) Both the Book of Mormon and the Holy Bible associate the very practices that Smith was engaged in with *false prophets* and with *demonic influence* and literally connect it with being disqualified from divinely appointed ministry. The idea that God took a prominent diviner, necromancer, and demon-worshipper and decided to call him to be a foundational prophet of a religion in an experience with a narrative structure (even on Smith's later version of the story) that exactly corresponds to all these money-digging yarns in the local context is manifestly absurd and contradicts both Mormon and Catholic theological loci. Furthermore, the idea it is consistent with prophetic calling to continue to engage in the activity after the call and subsequently *whitewash it* rather than repent of it is insane. The notion that God had him translate the book using the exact same technology that you have a reputation for using to do nefarious activities is also nuts. (4) Mormon sources report that there was *literally a demon rampage in early Mormon communities right after the restored Gospel was established there* and then when Joseph came to institute the authorities to manage the crisis, as he laid hands on a guy to ordain him as a priest, the demon possessed the guy and Joseph had to be shamed into admitting it was a demon. Then, the demon took turns possessing all the Mormon leadership all night long. After this incident, it seems that basically every Mormon leader would at some point be possessed by a demon and/or gave false prophesies on behalf of demons, including Joseph himself!!!