Item Detail
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27374
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1
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0
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English
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Joseph Smith's Developing Relationship with the Apocrypha
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Approaching Antiquity : Joseph Smith and the Ancient World
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Provo, UT
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Religious Studies Center, BYU
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331-355
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For LDS scholars, the presence of parallels to intertestamental and Christian Apocrypha in early Mormon writings has demonstrated that Joseph Smith restored ancient doctrines and practices. For non-LDS scholars, the presence of parallels has been used to draw attention to the possibility that Joseph plagiarized available sources. Unfortunately, neither solution is probable. The larger reality is that the presence of such parallels may arise out of a much more mundane event: his family, or perhaps even Joseph, was accustomed to reading a Bible in which the Apocrypha were included and that the language of the Apocrypha is echoed in Joseph's early writings. This paper will demonstrate that like many of his contemporaries, Joseph Smith was interested in apocryphal literature for its overall implications regarding the Christian biblical canon, its potential to hold hidden truths, and its allure in presenting "historical" details within the well-known biblical accounts. [From the text]