Book of Mormon/Translation/Method/1841-1845

1841

Hostile press account Christian Advocate and Journal (17 Dec 1841)

Little enough did “Joseph Smith, jr., author and proprietor” of said book, imagine such events, and yet such have taken place! Gladly would he while engaged in “peeping;” sometimes into an old hat, and at others into the spectacles, “called Urim and Thummim,” through which he was enabled to read “the plates,” and dictate to Oliver Cowdery, his amanuensis; gladly, no doubt, would he then have swapped his whole interest in the concern for a fifty acre farm in Michigan. ^[1]

• Scribe: Oliver Cowdery
• Curtain: Not specified
• Instrument: Varies: (a) peep stone in hat; or (b) spectacles ("Urim and Thummim")
• Method: Stone in hat or looking into the spectacles

Charles Anthon, quoting Martin Harris (witness) Gleanings by the Way (letter of 3 April 1841, not published until 1842)

On my asking him by whom the copy was made, he gravely stated, that along with the golden book there had been dug up a very large pair of spectacles! So large in fact that if a man were to hold them in front of his face, his two eyes would merely look through one of the glasses, and the remaining part of the spectacles would project a considerable distance sideways! These spectacles possessed, it seems a very valuable property, of enabling any one who looked through them, (or rather through one of the lenses,) not only to decypher the characters on the plates, but also to comprehend their exact meaning, and be able to translate them!! My informant assured me that this curious property of the spectacles had been actually tested, and found to be true. A young man, it seems, had been placed in the garret of a farmhouse, with a curtain before him, and having fastened the spectacles to his head, had read several pages in the golden book, and communicated their contents in writing to certain persons stationed on the outside of the curtain. He had also copied off one page of the book in the original character, which he had in like manner handed over to those who were separated [234] from him by the curtain, and this copy was the paper which the countryman had brought with him.^[2]

• Scribe: Martin Harris
• Curtain: present
• Instrument: Nephite interpreters ("spectacles")
• Method: "fastened the spectacles to his head"

1842

John A. Clark (non-eyewitness), Gleanings by the Way

The way that Smith made his transcripts and transcriptions for Harris was the following. Although in the same room, a thick curtain or blanket was suspended between them, and Smith concealed behind the blanket, pretended to look through his spectacles, or transparent stones, and would then write down or repeat what he saw, which, when repeated aloud, was written down by Harris, who sat on the other side of the suspended blanket. Harris was told that it would arouse the most terrible divine displeasure, if he should attempt to draw near the sacred chest, or look at Smith while engaged in the work of decyphering the mysterious characters. This was Harris's own account of the matter to me. ^[3]

• Scribe: Martin Harris
• Curtain: present
• Instrument: Nephite interpreters ("spectacles"); Transparent stones
• Method: "look through his spectacles"

== Notes ==

1. [note]  “Prevalence of Mormonism,” Christian Advocate and Journal (New York) 16, no. 17 (8 December 1841). off-site
2. [note]  Rev. John A. Clark, Gleanings by the Way, (Philadelphia: W.J. and J.K. Simon; New York: Robert Carter, 1842), 233–234 off-site (italics in original)
3. [note] Rev. John A. Clark, Gleanings by the Way, (Philadelphia: W.J. and J.K. Simon; New York: Robert Carter, 1842), 224, 228, 230-31 off-site; part of this chapter on the Mormons appeared as a letter in the Episcopal Recorder 18 (1846): 94. This interview was also reprinted in "Modern Superstition.-The Mormonites.-No. I;' Visitor, or Monthly Instructor (1841): 62, 63-64.