Misleading BYU students?

The recent video from the ironically named "Informed Saints" youtube channel suggests that professors at BYU are not educating their students about the facts regarding the translation of the Book of Mormon. Instead, they are misleading them to promote SITH (SITH = stone-in-the-hat theory)

The panel members in this video, like other SITH promoters, ignore the FAITH model and mingle their own assumptions, inferences and theories with actual facts so that it is difficult for people who are not fully aware of the facts to distinguish between the two categories.

My detailed response to the video will come out soon, but for now, here is an example.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AiAx1CVPlc0

At the outset, we noted that the American Historical Association Standards for Professional Conduct include these standards. 

Professional integrity in the practice of history requires awareness of one’s own biases and a readiness to follow sound method and analysis wherever they may lead. Historians should document their findings and be prepared to make available their sources, evidence, and data, including any documentation they develop through interviews. Historians should not misrepresent their sources. They should report their findings as accurately as possible and not omit evidence that runs counter to their own interpretation.

Listeners can watch this video and see this panel create and attack straw men while omitting evidence that counters their interpretations. 

They come across as perfectly comfortable with their approach, as though they talk the same way in other settings--including classes at BYU.

Here is Gerrit Dirkmaat relating what he teaches his students in his religion classes at BYU

28:48

I was just rereading for my class on the Book of Mormon I'm teaching this semester, the accounts from Emma Smith and Martin Harris and Emma's accounts 

28:58

especially are some of my favorites because to your point, she explicitly says, you know, my husband would put the 

29:04

stone in his hat and he would look at it and the words would appear and he would dictate hour after hour without any breaks or interruptions. 

Emma's "Last Testimony" is one of Gerrit's favorites, presumably because it confirms his SITH bias. 

We cannot tell from the video whether Gerrit explains to his students the credibility problems with the "Last Testimony" pursuant to the AHA standards, but seeing that this is one his "favorites," he surely relates the "Last Testimony" the same way he presented it in this video and in his books; i.e., as a completely credible account on its face.

Everyone who hears or reads Emma's "Last Testimony" should be aware of at least some of the relevant facts. Emma's son Joseph Smith III ("JS III") visited his mother in Nauvoo from February 4-10, 1879. This was 50 years after the translation took place. There is no known record of Emma relating these so-called details prior to this "Last Testimony."

JS III He recorded the questions and answers. JS III had prepared the questions in advance and avoided follow-up questions for more specificity, possibly in light of Emma's health. She died 10 weeks later on April 30, 1879 (age 74). The "Last Testimony" was published posthumously on Oct 1, 1879.  

In an 1886 article in the Saints' Herald reviewing the evidence about the translation, JS III did not even mention his mother's "Last Testimony." Instead, he relied on what Joseph and Oliver said all along. 

He also rejected the SITH statements from David Whitmer.

Consider this irony: while Joseph Smith III did not cite his own mother's "Last Testimony" as authoritative or even persuasive on how Joseph produced the Book of Mormon, modern SITH proponents such as Gerrit and the other panelists in this video cite the "Last Testimony" as conclusive evidence.

When Gerrit teaches his students about one of his "favorites," he does not have to explain the problems with the "Last Testimony." He does not have to do so when he does podcasts.

But no doubt his students and listeners trust him to do so. As do the professional standards of the AHA.

And we can all see that he does not do it.

For more problems with the "Last Testimony," see 

https://www.ldshistoricalnarratives.com/2023/08/credibility-of-emma-smiths-last.html

Consider another irony. Among other problems with the "Last Testimony," it has Emma denying that Joseph practiced plural marriage. This generated considerable reaction in Utah at the time, with numerous people denouncing the "Last Testimony" as false, possibly not even Emma's actual statement, etc. Nevertheless, the "Last Testimony" is one of the ""favorites" among the polygamy deniers.

Most if not all LDS historians reject Emma's "Last Testimony" regarding plural marriage, but then SITH-promoting historians such as those on the panel in this video consider those parts of the "Last Testimony" as the gospel truth.

This intellectual schizophrenia is common among SITH scholars.

_____

Similar omissions of relevant facts are found throughout the video, which we will see next.