The MILLENIAL HARBINGER publishes Alexander Campbell's critique of the Book of Mormon: "There never was a book more evidently written by one set of fingers, nor more certainly conceived in one cranium since the first book appeared in human language, than this same book." "It is as certainly Smith's fabrication as Satan is the father of lies. . . ." Campbell finds signs of Joseph's culture scattered through the book including Masonry and republican government, characteristic Yankee phrases, and opinions on many of the theological controversies of the time: "infant baptism, ordination, the trinity, regeneration, repentance, justification, the fall of man, the atonement, transubstantiation, fasting, penance, church government, religious experience, the call to the ministry, the general resurrection, eternal punishment. . . .every error and almost every truth discussed in N. York for the last ten years." Still more revealing to Campbell were the grammatical errors, which he calle
d "Smithisms." (1)
-- 180 years ago today - Feb 7, 1831
The organization of the second quorum of Seventy was commenced at Kirtland. (2)
-- 175 years ago today - Feb 7, 1836 (Sunday)
[Mark Hofmann] Rendell says several Hofmann documents are forgeries, but he is not sure about Harris letter. Prominent LDS historians, with only media reports about case for fraud to counter earlier reports showing authenticity, maintain view that some of the documents are authentic. (3)
-- 25 years ago today - Feb 7, 1986
1 - This Day in Mormon History, http://www.advent-adam.com/jakestand.html
2 - Jenson, Andrew, Church Chronology
3 - Whittaker, David J., The Hofmann Maze, A Book Review Essay with a Chronology and Bibliography of the Hofmann Case, BYU Studies Vol. 29, No. 1, pg.80,
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