The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints is a Plausible Religion

Good luck Con! ---Fallacies--- Red herring: This occurs when a speaker attempts to distract an audience by deviating from the topic at hand by introducing a separate argument which the speaker believes will be easier to speak to. ---Argument--- Con is arguing that because Joseph Smith is in Cons opinion insane the Mormon religion is false. Religion is a set of beliefs followed by a group of people. If the leader is allegedly insane is irrelevant. 14 million people are LDS around the world. They all share the same beliefs thus The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints is a plausible religion. We abelieve in bGod, the Eternal Father, and in His cSon, Jesus Christ, and in the dHoly Ghost. http://lds.org... ---Joseph Smith was not insane--- The argument that the Prophet Joseph Smith is insane could be made for any religious leader. Jesus Christ the leader of LDS and of all Christian had visions. God in the Bible gave out the Urim and Thummim to people in the Old Testament. The Muslim religion Prophet Mohammad had a vision. Buddha claimed to have a great awakening. Urim and Thummim in Old Testament Exodus 28:30; 1 Samuel 28:6; Ezra 2:63 ---Character Witnesses of Joseph Smith--- Books With the exception of I. Woodbridge Riley’s work, The Founder of Mormonism: A Psychological Study of Joseph Smith, Jr., (1902) in which the author sought to examine Joseph Smith’s character from the standpoint of psychology, almost every significant non-Mormon study of Joseph Smith from 1834 to the present has used the Hurlbut framework. In contrast to the Cole-Hurlbut picture of Joseph Smith is the view set forth by people much better acquainted with him and less biased. Writing in personal diaries and letters, unmotivated by bitterness or the prospect of publication, close observers left detailed descriptions that give an understanding of the Prophet more consistent with his own religious pretensions and more factually accurate than the observations of his critics. Joseph Smith was founder of a religion that promotes doing well. LDS is now up to 14 million members who are good people of the world. The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints has donated money, time and goods to help people around the world. A wicked or insane mad would not start a religion that promotes good morals. ---Rebuttals--- 1. Joseph Smith did use a seer stone with his family to find buried treasure before he translated the BOM. In the 1800's it was common for people to believe in superstition, divination, magic, astrology, treasure digging etc. It is important to note he never did during or after the BOM translation. "It is often difficult for us in the twentieth century to appreciate the world from the perspective of earlier generations.... All of us have a tendency to assume that our progenitors saw the world much as we see it today." Quinn(1987) 2. If you believe Joseph Smith was a wizard it is not that unlikely for him to be a prophet. Same thing I said above can be applied here for him digging treasure. 3. “Several modified or "reformed" Egyptian scripts are well known, including forms called Demotic and Hieratic. "Reformed Egyptian" is clearly an appropriate generic term for those writing systems. However, the "Reformed Egyptian" used by the Nephites is described as a language system unique to them (Mormon 9:32-34).” Jeff Lindsay 7. Again Con seems to be exaggerating evidence. Joseph Smith was the sole prophet. Oliver Cowdery was never a prophet. Oliver Cowdery had priesthood powers which are healing the sick and giving blessings. 9. It is actually called priesthood. When a man holds the priesthood he can heal the sick through his faith and the sick person’s faith. Healing the sick is in the bible and most other Christian religions practice healing. 10. True it is called the Book of Abraham. 12 and 13. Con has no idea what he is talking about with these two. There was an extermination order given to the Mormons in Missouri because we didn’t believe in slavery and we were a new religion. We were killed and kicked out of our homes unjustifiably. Joseph Smith mysteriously escaped from jail when he was arrested because of the extermination order. Joseph Smith may have bribed the guard it is unknown. 14. In the LDS religion we believe we need to be married to reach the highest glory of Heaven. We are sealed to our spouse (one) for eternity. In The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints http://www.lds.org... we believe we get our families for eternity. Not just time but eternity. 15. There have been 44 presidents in America. Closing: I don’t have enough space to rebuttal all of CONS points. CON is assuming just because the Prophet Joseph Smith had visions and miracles occur LDS is not a religion. It is not proper for CON to say a religion (set of beliefs) is not a religion because of those reasons. Most religions around the world have had miracles occur. Since most religions around the world have had miracles occur, Con cannot count that against LDS as not being a plausible religion. Furthermore, everything stated above proves that The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints http://www.lds.org... is a plausible religion compared to other religions.