Buddhist Catholic Contemplative Evangelical General Christian Hindu Jewish Latter-day Saint Muslim New Visions Progressive Christian

Beliefs

Topics

Columnists

Resource Library

Research Tools

Video

Podcasts

Thought Readers

Faith In Media Tracker

Newsletters

Ad-Free & Subscriber Log-In Subscription Support

Follow Patheos

Home
Latter-day Saint
Travel and Religion
It’s so big!

It’s so big!

Last updated on: August 19, 2024 at 8:10 pm by Dan Peterson

0 Comments

It’s so big! 2024-08-19T20:10:37-06:00 Dan Peterson

LOGO Patheos Explore the world's faith through different perspectives on religion and spirituality! Patheos has the views of the prevalent religions and spiritualities of the world.

Retired federal judge Paul Warner is the featured interview in this latest very short video from the Interpreter Foundation, titled “Testimony of a Judge.” We hope that you will enjoy these short features, which have been drawn from the Interpreter Foundation’s 2022 docudrama Undaunted: Witnesses of the Book of Mormon.

However, not only do we hope that you’ll enjoy them, we hope that you will share them with others. And today, Sunday, is a great day on which to do that. Of course, Monday would also be a great day. As would (now that I think of it) Tuesday. And Wednesday . . .

Joseph Smith (Paul Wuthrich) and Martin Harris (Lincoln Hoppe), at work on the translation of the Book of Mormon in a scene from the Interpreter Foundation’s 2021 theatrical film, “Witnesses.”

As I sat in our ward’s Sunday school class today, I suddenly began to marvel at the sheer size of the Book of Mormon — which, according to Royal Skousen, totals 270,002 words

By contrast, the Qur’an — to which the Book of Mormon is occasionally compared — is 77,797 words long in its original Classical Arabic. That is approximately 80% of the length of the New Testament (which, accordingly, totals something close to 100,000 words altogether). And, according to Islamic sources, the Qur’an was revealed over the space of twenty-two years, between AD 610 and Muhammad’s death in AD 632. That’s rather longer than the 2.5 months required for the dictation of the Book of Mormon.

The Old Testament book of Isaiah is 25,608 words long in its original Hebrew text. Jeremiah, the longest book in the entire Bible, is 33,002. No single book in the New Testament even comes close. Between his own gospel and the Acts of the Apostles, which he also wrote, Luke weighs in at a total of 37,932 words. A well-educated physician, he is the most voluminous contributor to the New Testament. By contrast, with all of his many epistles, the apostle Paul (who was also exceptionally well-educated) comes in at second place, with 32,408.

The Torah or Pentateuch — Genesis (32,046), Exodus (25,957), Leviticus (18,852), Numbers (25,048), and Deuteronomy (23,008) — is sometimes known as the Five Books of Moses. Taken altogether, it is at the absolute core of Judaism. And, in their entirety, those five books reach the impressive sum of 124,911 words. But that’s substantially less than half the word count of the Book of Mormon.

So far as I’m aware, therefore, the Book of Mormon stands as the single largest purportedly revealed text in the Abrahamic tradition, and it does so by a considerable margin. If one adds into the mix the Doctrine and Covenants and the Pearl of Great Price — which, at a hasty glance, represent respectively about 125,000 words and around 25,000 words, it becomes clear (based on an approximate total of 420,000 words, and unless there’s a competitor of whom I’m unaware) that Joseph Smith is by far the single most prolific contributor of purportedly scriptural text within any significant strand of the Judeo-Christian or Islamic religious tradition. He’s actually not very far behind the entire Old Testament, which (at least according to one count) comes to 503,493 — and which was written over the span of well over a thousand years.

I’ve said nothing at all here about the richness and complexity of the Book of Mormon, on which I could say a very great deal. And I’ve said nothing about the witnesses to the Book of Mormon, whose testimonies stand squarely in the path of anybody who hopes to write the book off as nothing more than the product of Joseph Smith’s purely subjective imagination.

I simply pose the question of why, if Joseph set out to pretend to prophethood, he chose to go to the enormous effort of creating such a massive work. Nobody else in the entire Abrahamic tradition of whom I’m aware, perhaps (though I can’t think of any) with the possible exception of one or two obscure actors who have plainly sought to create something in explicit imitation of Joseph Smith, has done anything of comparable magnitude.

Some dismiss Joseph as if the Book of Mormon were merely something that one casually “tosses off” in a passing, dramatic, whimsical pseudo-prophetic gesture. It is not. The highly educated but unbelieving Fawn Brodie said that his imagination simply “overflowed like a spring freshet.” I wonder, though, how many years she required to write her biography of him.

Of course, its sheer length doesn’t prove the Book of Mormon true. But its length does strongly suggest that it shouldn’t merely be brushed dismissively aside.

A modern icon of the great Egyptian Church Father St. Athanasius, twentieth Christian bishop of Alexandria (Wikimedia Commons public domain image). By, umm, contrast, modern Latter-day Saint bishops tend to favor more subdued colors for their episcopal vestments.

A new bishopric was announced for our ward this morning. The new bishop — whom I would guess to be in his mid-forties — lives across the street from us but has been in the ward only a relatively short time and (partly because we travel so much, and partly because I’m such an anti-social and unpleasant person) I don’t know him well. I was already aware that he’s a physician and that his wife is an attorney, but I looked him up — and I found an impressive academic background: He is a specialist in neonatology who earned his medical degree at the University of Chicago and followed that up with a residency in pediatrics at the Dartmouth Hitchcock Medical Center in Vermont and a fellowship and a Master’s in Public Health at the University of Washington. I also learned from his remarks today that he served as a missionary under my former Brigham Young University colleague Don Jarvis, which means that he speaks Russian.

We have interesting neighbors.

The new first counselor in our bishopric is Ryan Knowlton, whom I feel free to mention here by name because he’s already publicly associated with me and my evil deeds: A professional designer by trade, he’s worked with us on the publicity for our films Witnesses and Undaunted: Witnesses of the Book of Mormon — he even has a small speaking role in Undaunted — and has again been working with us toward the release of Six Days in August on 10 October 2024.

The new second counselor is another relatively recent addition to our ward. He is also our next-door neighbor, which is likely to blacken his name so sufficiently in the minds of some that I feel it unnecessary to add anything more. Instead, I follow my longstanding policy of not subjecting otherwise innocent people to the tenderly slanderous mercies of my most obsessive online critics. I won’t identify people whose only offense is having come into contact with me.

Travel and Religion

History and Religion

Previous Post

August 17, 2024

The Temple and the Principle of "Semper Reformanda"

Next Post

August 19, 2024 "He thought it no sin"

Recent Comments

0 | Leave a Comment

"Sutherland's lecture sounds interesting. He seems to restate the Washington consensus that trade brings peace ..."

B. Wilson

Learning more about a region of ..."

"In a meeting today, I learned another important reason why accurate (or at least as ..."

the PROBLEM

From Serbia’s “White City,” Belgrade

"I've been watching a lot of video interviews of NDErs and researchers. I think in ..."

brotheroflogan

Accounts of Premortality?

"PL: "Let's hope he doesn't have your address..."I have to frankly confess that a few ..."

DanielPeterson

From Serbia’s “White City,” Belgrade

Browse Our Archives

Select a Category Uncategorized

Select a Month October 2026 September 2026 August 2026 July 2026 June 2026 May 2026 April 2026 March 2026 February 2026 January 2026 December 2025 November 2025 October 2025 September 2025 August 2025 July 2025 June 2025 May 2025 April 2025 March 2025 February 2025 January 2025 December 2024 November 2024 October 2024 September 2024 August 2024 July 2024 June 2024 May 2024 April 2024 March 2024 February 2024 January 2024 December 2023 November 2023 October 2023 September 2023 August 2023 July 2023 June 2023 May 2023 April 2023 March 2023 February 2023 January 2023 December 2022 November 2022 October 2022 September 2022 August 2022 July 2022 June 2022 May 2022 April 2022 March 2022 February 2022 January 2022 December 2021 November 2021 October 2021 September 2021 August 2021 July 2021 June 2021 May 2021 April 2021 March 2021 February 2021 January 2021 December 2020 November 2020 October 2020 September 2020 August 2020 July 2020 June 2020 May 2020 April 2020 March 2020 February 2020 January 2020 December 2019 November 2019 October 2019 September 2019 August 2019 July 2019 June 2019 May 2019 April 2019 March 2019 February 2019 January 2019 December 2018 November 2018 October 2018 September 2018 August 2018 July 2018 June 2018 May 2018 April 2018 March 2018 February 2018 January 2018 December 2017 November 2017 October 2017 September 2017 August 2017 July 2017 June 2017 May 2017 April 2017 March 2017 February 2017 January 2017 December 2016 November 2016 October 2016 September 2016 August 2016 July 2016 June 2016 May 2016 April 2016 March 2016 February 2016 January 2016 December 2015 November 2015 October 2015 September 2015 August 2015 July 2015 June 2015 May 2015 April 2015 March 2015 February 2015 January 2015 December 2014 November 2014 March 2014 August 2013 February 2012

TAKE THE

Religious Wisdom Quiz

Which Christian group is known for its emphasis on health and diet?

Select your answer to see how you score.

Presbyterians Methodists Jehovah’s Witnesses Seventh-day Adventists