More fun with SITH to start 2026

When I write "fun with SITH" it's not because I think SITH is funny.

Not at all.

In my view, SITH is tragic.

After all, it originated with the first anti-Mormon book Mormonism Unvailed, which picked it up partly from one of the original anti-Mormons Jonathan Hadley of Palmyra. 

Joseph, Oliver, and their successors in Church leadership denounced it and reiterated Joseph's explanation that he translated the plates by means of the Urim and Thummim that came with the plates.

But then certain LDS scholars decided it was more fun to resurrect the Mormonism Unvailed narrative, and now they've managed to turn it into quasi-canonized status through the Gospel Topics Essay.

Pure tragedy.

That's why from time to time we post examples from social media.

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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w04xU72SJNQ

0:00

I got to sit down for this one. Okay, so I get sent a lot of crazy stories about Mormon faith construction. This one I'm going to tell you is legit the craziest thing that I have heard involving Elder Holland. So get comfy. 

0:14

So my friend is serving a mission in the early '90s. Let's say in Wisconsin. In this particular area, the people are really kind, but they just are not open to hearing about Mormonism except for one person, a pastor, a Christian pastor. So he says to them, "Come over to my house. I will feed you dinner. You can teach me your doctrine and I get to share some things with you. Deal?" 

0:38

And they were like, "Yeah, this is great." They developed this great rapport with this pastor family. So one day when they're done sharing their discussion, the pastor says, "I want to now talk to you about Mormon history." They're like, "Great. We're experts in Mormon history.

0:52

We're missionaries." He said, "Okay, so you must know then that Joseph Smith translated the Book of Mormon using rocks in a hat." He said they were magic rocks. He would put them in a hat. They would illuminate the words that were to be written for the Book of Mormon. And that's how the Book of Mormon came about. The missionaries looked at each other and went, "I don't think so." The pastor responded, "Yeah, see, that's the thing. Most people of the LDS faith don't know their real history." 

1:20

My friend was so troubled by this situation. This kind person sharing information that just couldn't possibly be true. 

1:29

It just so happened that Elder Holland was visiting the area at that time. My friend ended up sitting down with Elder Holland to talk to him about this matter. He tells him, "Look, I sat down with this pastor. He told me about these rocks and a hat and Joseph Smith."

1:41

And Elder Holland responded, "Elder, how does that make you feel?" He says, "Well, it makes me feel terrible inside. absolutely sick to my stomach. To which Elder Holland replies, I want you to remember that feeling. This is an example of how the adversary is planting lies. This is evidence of the truthfulness of the gospel. Otherwise, why would Satan be working so hard against it? It made sense. 

2:07

My friend went home from his mission. He married. He had a beautiful family. And years later, he would be teaching gospel doctrine. After one gospel doctrine class, someone came to him and said, "I really appreciated your lesson because I've been really struggling with my testimony." He says, "What have you been struggling with?" He says, "Well, the gospel topics essays, in particular, the one about the rocks and the hat." 

2:30

My friend pauses and as the man continues to talk, his life sort of flashes before his eyes. The church has come forward explaining that Joseph Smith translated the Book of Mormon with rocks in a hat and that that was the end for him.

@SteveSmith-os5bs

3 hours ago

I went on my mission to Michigan in 1978. I remember showing investigators a picture of Joseph Smith translating the Book of Mormon directly from the gold plates. It was decades later that I found out that Joseph Smith translated the whole book using magic seer stones in a hat. It wasn't any one thing that pushed me out of the church, it was continuing to find out that the entire church history was built on lie after lie and exaggeration.

@starguy2718

5 hours ago

Mormon Church: "The rocks in the hat story is more lies from Satan." Also Mormon Church: "Um, actually the rocks in the hat story is true."

 

More from Alfred...

 

More fun with SITH in Saints, volume 1

 

I'm finally getting around to annotating the Saints book, volume 1. We continually meet people who have read Saints and believe it is accurate.

I wish it was. It could easily be corrected, except no one in the Church History Department seems to care about correcting errors.

I noticed this example from chapter 3:

Look at this sentence:

Moroni said that God had chosen Joseph to renew the covenant, and that if he chose to be faithful to God’s commands, he would be the one to reveal the record on the plates.¹¹

This is fun because note 11 cites Letter IV. 

Oliver Cowdery, “Letter IV,” LDS Messenger and Advocate, Feb. 1835, 1:78–79 (see also later version, in JSP, H1:59); Lucy Mack Smith, History, 1844–45, book 3, [11].

Instead of linking to Letter IV in the Joseph Smith Papers, which would be easy and clear, the link goes to the cover of the Messenger and Advocate on archive.org!

Then you have to find pages 78-9 which looks like this:

​

and it is the wrong page!

Below is the passage on page 80, which of course they would never actually quote in Saints because Moroni specifically told Joseph he had the privilege to translate with the Urim and Thummim that came with the plates. 

Instead, the historians want to make people think Moroni told Joseph he would "reveal the record;" i.e., that instead of using the Urim and Thummim and actually translating the engravings, Joseph would read words that appeared on the stone-in-the-hat (SITH).

It would be far more accurate, and clearer to readers, if Saints simply quoted the reference instead of paraphrasing it and completely changing the meaning.

Here is the actual passage.

He said this history was written and deposited not far from that place, and that it was our brother’s privilege, if obedient to the commandments of the Lord, to obtain and translate the same by the means of the Urim and Thummim, which were deposited for that purpose with the record.

https://www.josephsmithpapers.org/paper-summary/history-1834-1836/68

M2Cers blames Mormon

M2Cer blames Mormon for not writing more than a hundredth part.

_____

13 And now there are many records kept of the proceedings of this people, by many of this people, which are particular and very large, concerning them.

14 But behold, a hundredth part of the proceedings of this people, yea, the account of the Lamanites and of the Nephites, 

and their wars, and contentions, and dissensions, 

and their preaching, and their prophecies, 

and their shipping and their building of ships, 

and their building of temples, and of synagogues and their sanctuaries, and their righteousness, 

and their wickedness, and their murders, and their robbings, and their plundering, 

and all manner of abominations and whoredoms, cannot be contained in this work.

15 But behold, there are many books and many records of every kind, and they have been kept chiefly by the Nephites.
(Helaman 3:13–15)

1 or 2: Cumorah and seer stones

 

Where to find seer stones

 

SITH as the "best evidence"

I had forgotten about this gem: 

The hat is our strongest evidence of a divine translation through the gift and power of God.

It comes from this post:

Church historians of an earlier era were embarrassed at the image of Joseph Smith with his head buried in his hat. The hat is our strongest evidence of a divine translation through the gift and power of God. Joseph Smith was not consulting reference materials. He was not collaborating with a team of experts. He was reading words that appeared on a stone in the bottom of a hat. The whole thing is simply astonishing and supernatural.

Joseph put his face in a hat to shut out light so the words appearing on his seer stone were easier to read. This is a direct fulfillment of Alma 37:23 interpreted in light of pre-1981 editions of D&C Sections 78, 82 & 104 where Joseph Smith is called "Gazelam."

https://bookofmormonresources.blogspot.com/2015/03/english-in-book-of-mormon.html

Some of us think that what Joseph and Oliver explained is the strongest evidence of divine translation. 

https://www.mobom.org/church-history-issues

But people can believe whatever they want.

If people prefer the Mormonism Unvailed explanation instead of what Joseph and Oliver said... well, that's why we have this blog.

:)