Informed Saints

Latest Episodes:

Where Is the Hill Cumorah? (The Truth About Book of Mormon Geography) Sep 20, 2026

Show notes

Everyone knows where the Hill Cumorah is… right? Joseph Smith received the gold plates from a hill in upstate New York. But is that the same hill where Mormon hid the Nephite records and the Nephites made their last stand in Mormon 6? It's one of the most debated questions in Book of Mormon geography, and the history behind it may surprise you.

In this episode of Informed Saints, Jasmin Rappleye, Neal Rappleye, and Stephen Smoot walk through what the Book of Mormon itself says about Cumorah, trace when the New York hill first came to be called by that name, and look at what the Church has officially said. Along the way they draw on the Joseph Smith Papers, the Church's "Book of Mormon Geography" statement, and the Hill Cumorah issue of the Journal of Book of Mormon Studies, including archaeologist John E. Clark's assessment of the site.

Chapters:

0:00 The Hill Cumorah background

5:35 Is it in New York?

12:00 Assessing the sources

16:57 What’s from Joseph Smith?

21:21 David Whitmer sources

25:27 The Church’s position

28:00 What the BoM says?

35:15 Looking at the archeology

42:50 Another candidate in Mexico

47:00 Conclusion - Learning more

===Informed Saints Credits===

Produced by The Ancient America Foundation

Producer: Spencer Clark

Hosts: Stephen Smoot, Neal Rappleye, Jasmin Rappleye

Further Readings:

Journal of Book of Mormon Studies, Hill Cumorah issue: https://scholarsarchive.byu.edu/jbms/vol13/iss1/

"Book of Mormon Geography," Gospel Topics: www.churchofjesuschrist.org/study/manual/gospel-topics/book-of-mormon-geography

Our Book of Mormon geography episode with Brant Gardner: https://youtu.be/lHEAG87wh9Y

https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/study/manual/hill-cumorah-site-guide/03-curators-notes

https://scripturecentral.org/archive/books/book/introduction-study-book-mormon

https://contentdm.lib.byu.edu/digital/collection/MStar/id/27175/

https://www.josephsmithpapers.org/paper-summary/lucy-mack-smith-history-1844-1845/41

https://interpreterfoundation.org/journal/the-cowdery-conundrum-olivers-aborted-attempt-to-describe-joseph-smiths-first-vision-in-1834-and-1835

https://bhroberts.org/records/pWTXhj-mc2Zjf/w_w_phelps_identifies_the_hill_cumorah_as_being_in_new_york

https://www.josephsmithpapers.org/paper-summary/history-1838-1856-volume-a-1-23-december-1805-30-august-1834/9

https://bookofmormonresources.blogspot.com/2016/10/ramahcumorah.html

https://bhroberts.org/records/zrSENb-yN34Vd/heber_c_kimball_recounts_the_cumorah_cave

https://mappingmormonism.byu.edu/the-restoration-1820-1845

https://archive.org/details/bookofmormonaccosmit/page/46/mode/2up

https://bhroberts.org/records/QSDbqc-gQTr6j/frederick_g_williams_identifies_chile_as_the_landing_spot_of_lehi

https://bhroberts.org/records/pWTXhj-Qd94Vc/observer_and_telegraph_reports_early_church_leaders_saying_lehi_landed_in_south_america

https://scripturecentral.org/archive/books/book-chapter/letter-vii

Subscribe to Informed Saints for faithful scholarship on the scriptures and Church history every week.

Study deeply, believe boldly.

===Discover===

If any of our thoughts resonated with you, consider learning more about the single most influential book in our lives.

https://www.discoverbookofmormon.org/

===Content Disclaimer===

The views expressed represent ours alone and do not necessarily reflect the official position of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.

#BookOfMormon #HillCumorah #Cumorah #LDS #LatterDaySaints #ChurchOfJesusChrist #JosephSmith #Moroni #Mormon6 #BookOfMormonGeography #Mesoamerica #Heartland #OliverCowdery #LetterVII #ChurchHistory #GoldPlates #Palmyra #BookOfMormonEvidence #ComeFollowMe #InformedSaints

Most LDS Faith Crises Start in the Wrong Place. Here's Where to Begin. Sep 13, 2026

Show notes

Most people having a faith crisis are fighting on the branches — polygamy, DNA, the Book of Abraham, race and the priesthood — when the actual problem is buried somewhere underneath. What happens if you go all the way down to the roots and ask why anything exists at all?

Use discount code INFORMED15 for 15% off Walker Wrights Book!

https://fairlatterdaysaints.org/store/product/nourishing-the-roots/

Jasmin Rappleye, Neal Rappleye, and Stephen Smoot sit down with Walker Wright, author of Nourishing the Roots: Seeking the Foundations of Latter-day Saint Testimony, published by FAIR. Walker takes a faith crisis apart from the bottom up — existence, intelligibility, morality, consciousness, God, the Resurrection, and the gold plates — and closes with the story of losing his sister at 11 and the years of atheism that followed.

===Informed Saints Credits===

Produced by The Ancient America Foundation

Producer: Spencer Clark

Hosts: Stephen Smoot, Neal Rappleye, Jasmin Rappleye

In this episode:

Elder Uchtdorf's roots-and-branches metaphor, mapped onto the first three temple recommend questions
Why a branch you're struggling with can sometimes just be pruned — and why you still have to face the hard issues eventually
Larry Corbridge's primary vs. secondary questions, and why an organism explains it better than concentric circles
Why no artifact from the ancient Near East or Mesoamerica will move a committed skeptic — and what "lucky guess" really means
Why nothing can predate existence, and what that implies about something self-existent, necessary, and eternal
Laws of nature, why math matches them, and Joseph Smith's revelations on the light of truth that was not created or made
Where objective morality comes from, and why the Holocaust is the test case
Andrew Ferguson on Thomas Nagel: why no materialist actually lives like a materialist
Fine-tuning and Martin Rees's Just Six Numbers — expand slightly faster or slower and there's no you
The multiverse, the inverse gambler's fallacy, and why it's fine-tuning with extra steps
The hard problem of consciousness, "What Is It Like to Be a Bat?", and how Mind and Cosmos got Nagel ostracized
Philosophical zombies, the China brain, and Alvin Plantinga on other minds and properly basic belief
Eternal intelligence, the mind of man, and the hierarchy of intelligences in Abraham 3
Miracles, divine healings, and what an exorcism implies about a hierarchy of spirits
Are Latter-day Saints materialists? Goodness, truth, beauty, and the telos of eternal progression
The Resurrection as the decisive revelation — Paul's undisputed letters, the Gospels as Greco-Roman biographies, and a crucified messiah nobody expected
Why the eleven witnesses come up in every Christian-atheist debate, and why William Lane Craig and Trent Horn brush past them
Oliver Cowdery's hand in the printer's manuscript, Martin Harris's matter-of-fact language, and how early those sources really are
What kind of person could have written the Book of Mormon — Tolkien after twenty years at Oxford, or a farmhand with a stone in a hat?
John Clark's 1% problem and Matt Roper's work on anachronisms
Why Moroni's promise is a targeted spiritual experience and not Pam feeling God at Chili's
Walker's sister Nicole, the MTC moment that changed everything, and why a faith crisis is like a horror movie

Further Readings:

Use discount code INFORMED15 for 15% off!

https://fairlatterdaysaints.org/store/product/nourishing-the-roots/

https://scripturecentral.org/archive/periodicals/journal-article/archaeological-trends-and-book-mormon-origins

https://juvenileinstructor.org/1829-mormon-discovery-brought-to-you-by-guest-erin-jennings/

https://www.josephsmithpapers.org/paper-summary/printers-manuscript-of-the-book-of-mormon-circa-august-1829-circa-january-1830/467

https://newsroom.churchofjesuschrist.org/article/october-2019-general-conference-temple-recommend

Our earlier episode with Josh Gehly on the gold plates and the Resurrection: https://youtu.be/8u2LssCP2vo

Subscribe for more faithful scholarship every week. Study deeply, believe boldly.

===Discover===

If any of our thoughts resonated with you, consider learning more about the single most influential book in our lives.

https://www.discoverbookofmormon.org/

===Content Disclaimer===

The views expressed represent ours alone and do not necessarily reflect the official position of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.

#BookOfMormon #LDS #ComeFollowMe #FaithCrisis #InformedSaints #WalkerWright #NourishingTheRoots #FAIRLDS #LatterDaySaints #JosephSmith #GoldPlates #Apologetics #Testimony #Doubt #ChristianApologetics #Consciousness #FineTuning #ThomasNagel #AlvinPlantinga #Resurrection

What Church Looked Like Before the 3-Hour Block Sep 09, 2026

Show notes

The first sacrament meeting of the Restoration was held on a Tuesday. Latter-day Saints once drank homemade currant wine from a shared cup, sang hymns one line at a time because half the congregation couldn't read, and listened to music playing during the administration of the sacrament. Almost everything we picture when we say the word "church" is younger than we think.

Jasmin Rappleye, Neal Rappleye, and Stephen Smoot trace nearly two centuries of change in Latter-day Saint Sabbath worship — from open-air preaching in the Nauvoo grove to the 2026 two-hour block. There is no single standard history of this subject yet, so this episode pulls the thread together from separate histories of the sacrament, the Relief Society, the Sunday School, the Aaronic Priesthood, Primary, and the Young Women — including Justin Bray's work on the early sacrament.

Chapters:

0:00 Intro - Current Church Schedule Changes

6:16 Sacrament Meeting History

14:22 The Sacrament History

32:12 Relief Society & Youth Program Changes

36:36 Sunday School Changes

42:42 Young Men’s & Women’s

49:00 Age Categories

53:25 Conclusion - Inspired Direction

===Informed Saints Credits===

Produced by The Ancient America Foundation

Producer: Spencer Clark

Hosts: Stephen Smoot, Neal Rappleye, Jasmin Rappleye

Church Changes Bibliography

“https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/study/history/topics/sacrament-meetings?lang=eng,” in Church History Topics.

“https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/study/history/topics/sunday-school?lang=eng,” in Church History Topics.

“https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/study/history/topics/young-women-organizations?lang=eng,” in Church History Topics.

“https://churchhistorylibrary.churchofjesuschrist.org/guides/young-women-organization?lang=eng,” Church History Library Research Guides.

“https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/study/history/topics/relief-society?lang=eng,” in Church History Topics.

Janene Wolsey Baadsgaard, “https://www.thechurchnews.com/1999/3/20/23249076/cover-story-sunday-school-grew-from-humble-start/,” Church News (March 20, 1999).

Justin R. Bray, “https://rsc.byu.edu/you-shall-have-my-word/lords-supper-early-mormonism,” in You Shall Have My Word: Exploring the Text of the Doctrine and Covenants, ed. Scott C. Esplin, Richard O. Cowan, and Rachel Cope (Provo, UT: Religious Studies Center; Salt Lake City: Deseret Book, 2012), 64–74.

Justin R. Bray, "https://rsc.byu.edu/sacred-time/sabbath-sacrament-latter-day-saints," in Sacred Time: The Sabbath as a Perpetual Covenant, ed. Gaye Strathearn (Provo, UT: Religious Studies Center, Brigham Young University; Salt Lake City: Deseret Book), 207–42.

Rachel Cope, "https://rsc.byu.edu/vol-15-no-3-2014/thoughts-reclaiming-history-relief-society," Religious Educator 15, no. 3 (2014): 91–101.

William Hartley, https://byustudies.byu.edu/online-book/my-fellow-servants-essays-on-the-history-of-the-priesthood/from-men-to-boys, in My Fellow Servants: Essays on the History of the Priesthood (Provo, UT: BYU Studies, 2010).

William Hartley, https://byustudies.byu.edu/online-book/my-fellow-servants-essays-on-the-history-of-the-priesthood/mormon-sundays, in My Fellow Servants: Essays on the History of the Priesthood (Provo, UT: BYU Studies, 2010).

Glen M. Leonard, “https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/study/ensign/1974/12/125-years-of-the-sunday-classroom?lang=eng,” Ensign (December 1974).

Janet Peterson, “https://rsc.byu.edu/firm-foundation/young-women-zion-organizational-history,” in David J. Whittaker and Arnold K. Garr, eds., A Firm Foundation: Church Organization and Administration (Provo, Utah: Religious Studies Center, Brigham Young University, 2011), 277–94.

Mary Jane Woodger, “https://rsc.byu.edu/sites/default/files/pub_content/pdf/DOM_and_progressive_education.pdf,” Religious Educator 21, no. 1 (2020): 128–55.

Subscribe for more faithful scholarship every week. Study deeply, believe boldly.

===Discover===

If any of our thoughts resonated with you, consider learning more about the single most influential book in our lives.

https://www.discoverbookofmormon.org/

===Content Disclaimer===

The views expressed represent ours alone and do not necessarily reflect the official position of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.

#ChurchHistory #LatterdaySaints #LDS #BookOfMormon #ComeFollowMe #InformedSaints #TwoHourBlock #Sacrament #SacramentMeeting #ReliefSociety #YoungWomen #AaronicPriesthood

What 'Utterly Destroy' Really Means in the Book of Joshua Aug 23, 2026

Show notes

When Israel entered Canaan, the Bible says they were commanded to leave "nothing alive that breathes." Did God really command that — and did it actually happen? The Hebrew word behind the command, herem, tells a far more complicated story than you've heard.

Jasmin Rappleye, Neal Rappleye, and Stephen Smoot dig into David Calabro's chapter on herem from From Wilderness to Monarchy (Religious Studies Center) — exploring what the word really means, what the archaeology of Jericho, Ai, and Hazor actually shows, and how Latter-day Saints can honestly face divine violence in scripture.

===Informed Saints Credits===

Produced by The Ancient America Foundation

Producer: Spencer Clark

Hosts: Stephen Smoot, Neal Rappleye, Jasmin Rappleye

In this episode:

What herem means — and its surprising connection to "harem" and the Arabic haram
Herem across scripture: Malachi 4, Numbers 21, Deuteronomy 7, and Deuteronomy 20
Four inconsistent herem cases in Joshua: Jericho (Joshua 6), Ai (Joshua 7–8), the southern cities (Joshua 10), and Hazor
What archaeology shows at Jericho, Ai, and Hazor — and why the older conquest model collapsed
Competing theories of Israel's origins: conquest, gradual infiltration, peasant revolt, settling nomads
Ancient war rhetoric: K. Lawson Younger's Ancient Conquest Accounts, the Mesha Stele, the Merneptah Stele, and a royal inscription from Sheba
The moral problem: divine command theory, the wickedness of the Canaanites, Alex O'Connor's critique, and the question of children
Nephi's explanation in 1 Nephi 17:32–35
Latter-day Saint tools: Melchizedek as a prophet in Canaan (JST Genesis 14; Alma 13; D&C 84) — and why Latter-day Saints aren't inerrantists
The divine warrior motif and the violent world ancient Israel actually lived in
Divine violence in restoration scripture and history: Laban, 3 Nephi, and Zion's Camp

Read David Calabro's chapter free on the Religious Studies Center website:

https://rsc.byu.edu/wilderness-monarchy/thou-shalt-utterly-destroy

https://rsc.byu.edu/book/wilderness-monarchy

Subscribe to Informed Saints for more faithful scholarship on the scriptures. Study deeply, believe boldly.

===Discover===

If any of our thoughts resonated with you, consider learning more about the single most influential book in our lives.

https://www.discoverbookofmormon.org/

===Content Disclaimer===

The views expressed represent ours alone and do not necessarily reflect the official position of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.

#BookOfMormon #LDS #ComeFollowMe #OldTestament #BibleStudy #Herem #Joshua #ConquestOfCanaan #Canaanites #Jericho #BiblicalArchaeology #AncientHistory #Deuteronomy #MeshaStele #MerneptahStele #HebrewBible #LatterDaySaint #ScriptureStudy #Bible #InformedSaints

Mi'kmaq vs. the Gold Plates: Does the Comparison Hold Up? Aug 16, 2026

Show notes

A widely shared chart in an edition of an annotated Book of Mormon claims the characters Joseph Smith copied from the gold plates match an old Native American hieroglyphic script. But when one researcher traced every glyph back to its source, the trail led somewhere no one expected — to the most infamous forger in Latter-day Saint history.

In this episode, Jasmin Rappleye, Neal Rappleye, and Stephen Smoot sit down with Jerry Grover: an independent Book of Mormon researcher, geologist, and author of a book on the "characters document”. They walk through his new paper, published by the Interpreter Foundation, examining the claimed match between the gold plates characters and Mi'kmaq (Micmac) hieroglyphs.

===Informed Saints Credits===

Produced by The Ancient America Foundation

Producer: Spencer Clark

Hosts: Stephen Smoot, Neal Rappleye, Jasmin Rappleye

In this episode:

• What the "characters document" actually is — and why it isn't the Anthon transcript

• John Whitmer's handwriting, an 1887 photograph, and a New York broadside

• The documented origin of Mi'kmaq hieroglyphics: a 17th-century Catholic priest, birch bark, and Catholic prayers

• Why 10–14 look-alikes out of roughly 4,000 glyphs isn't statistically meaningful

• Mark Hofmann's forged "Anthon transcript" — and how its glyphs ended up in a modern comparison chart

• The Brazil phone call: "Come authenticate our gold plates"

• Wayne May's This Land, the Annotated Book of Mormon, and why citations matter

• A hopeful precedent: the photo that was corrected in an earlier edition

Read Jerry Grover's new paper at interpreterfoundation.org : https://interpreterfoundation.org/journal/mikmaq-meldrum-may-and-mark

Further Resources:

bmslr.org

https://bmslr.org/translation-of-the-caractors-document/

www.josephsmithpapers.org/paper-summary/appendix-2-document-1-characters-copied-by-john-whitmer-circa-1829-1831/1

ensignpeakfoundation.org/wp-content/uploads/2013/08/The-“Caractors”-Document.pdf

www.plonialmonimormon.com/2019/06/a-review-of-the-annotated-edition-of-the-book-of-mormon-part-2.html

Subscribe for more faithful scholarship on the Book of Mormon and Latter-day Saint history. Study deeply, believe boldly.

===Discover===

If any of our thoughts resonated with you, consider learning more about the single most influential book in our lives.

https://www.discoverbookofmormon.org/

===Content Disclaimer===

The views expressed represent ours alone and do not necessarily reflect the official position of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.

#BookOfMormon #LDS #LatterDaySaints #ComeFollowMe #Mikmaq #Micmac #AnthonTranscript #CharactersDocument #GoldPlates #JosephSmith #MarkHofmann #ReformedEgyptian #ChurchHistory #BookOfMormonEvidence #InterpreterFoundation #JerryGrover #Nephite #LDSHistory #FaithfulScholarship #InformedSaints

Song of Solomon: Can Uninspired Writing Be Scripture? Aug 09, 2026

Show notes

There's a book in your scriptures that Joseph Smith flagged as "not inspired," that Elder Bruce R. McConkie once called "biblical trash," and that the Come Follow Me manual skipped over entirely. It's also quoted three times in the Doctrine and Covenants — including in the Kirtland Temple dedicatory prayer. So what exactly is the Song of Solomon doing in our canon?

Jasmin Rappleye, Neal Rappleye, and Stephen Smoot work through Dana Pike's chapter on the Song of Solomon in From Wilderness to Monarchy: The Old Testament through the Lens of the Restoration, published by the Religious Studies Center at BYU — a volume of essays walking through the Old Testament from a Latter-day Saint perspective.

===Informed Saints Credits===

Produced by The Ancient America Foundation

Producer: Spencer Clark

Hosts: Stephen Smoot, Neal Rappleye, Jasmin Rappleye

In this episode:

What Shir Hashirim asher lishlomo actually means, and why the lamed preposition (le) makes the authorship question harder than it looks
Why biblical scholars date the Hebrew — including its Persian loanwords — well after Solomon's reign
How the book traveled into the canon: the Septuagint, the Dead Sea Scrolls at Qumran, and Rabbi Akiva's insistence that it is the holy of holies
Why the Song of Solomon is one of the few Old Testament books the New Testament never quotes, alongside Judges, Esther, and Ecclesiastes
The striking parallels with New Kingdom Egyptian love poetry — including calling the beloved "my sister"
Dana Pike's three-point case that the song didn't originate as inspired scripture
Tremper Longman III's alternative: that its place in the Bible testifies that God cares about our most intimate relationships
Joseph Smith's JST notation, what it tells us about the nature of the Joseph Smith Translation, and what "not inspired" most likely meant
Song of Solomon 6:10 in D&C 109:73, "Rose of Sharon" as a title for Christ in Elder Holland's teaching, and the little foxes in the Nauvoo Relief Society
The bigger question: what do we do with uninspired writing inside an inspired canon — and why Leviticus raises the very same problem

Read Dana Pike's chapter in From Wilderness to Monarchy: The Old Testament through the Lens of the Restoration from the BYU Religious Studies Center: https://rsc.byu.edu/book/wilderness-monarchy

Joseph Smith Papers Source: www.josephsmithpapers.org/paper-summary/old-testament-revision-2/104

Subscribe for more faithful scholarship on scripture, history, and the ancient world.

Study deeply, believe boldly.

===Discover===

If any of our thoughts resonated with you, consider learning more about the single most influential book in our lives.

https://www.discoverbookofmormon.org/

===Content Disclaimer===

The views expressed represent ours alone and do not necessarily reflect the official position of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.

#SongOfSolomon #SongOfSongs #OldTestament #ComeFollowMe #LDS #LatterDaySaints #BibleStudy #ScriptureStudy #JosephSmith #JST #DanaPike #HebrewBible #BiblicalScholarship #DeadSeaScrolls #Septuagint #RabbiAkiva #Solomon #DoctrineAndCovenants #InformedSaints

The Hebrew Grammar Joseph Smith Tried to Delete from the Book of Mormon Aug 02, 2026

Show notes

The Book of Mormon will not stop telling you where the record is. Who's holding it. Who handed it off. What they did with it and why. A retired trial attorney read that and recognized something from thirty years in courtrooms: a chain of custody.

Jasmin Rappleye, Neal Rappleye, and Stephen Smoot sit down with Stephen Lundwall: retired IP and business attorney and former BYU religion faculty, to talk about Authentic: The Book of Mormon, Evidences of a Miracle, written with his wife Rebecca Lundwall and published by Deseret Book. Lundwall makes the case the way he'd make it to a jury: witnesses, exhibits, cross-examination, and a closing argument.

===Informed Saints Credits===

Produced by The Ancient America Foundation

Producer: Spencer Clark

Hosts: Stephen Smoot, Neal Rappleye, Jasmin Rappleye

In this episode:

• What "provenance" means, and why archaeologists and attorneys care about the same thing

• Why Moroni being the final author of the record changes everything about the handoff

• Isaac Taylor's 1827 argument that ancient literature, history, and religion all rest on secure transmission — published the same year Moroni delivered the plates

• What the original and printer's manuscripts actually show, and why the translation itself is evidence

• Elizabeth Whitmer and Emma Smith on what they watched happen day after day

• The interruptions Joseph never needed read back to him

• The 28 words in Joseph Smith's own handwriting — the only ones in the entire manuscript

• How Oliver Cowdery learned to spell Coriantumr

• The Hebraic "if–and" conditional in Moroni 10:4 that Joseph edited out of later editions

• Bernard DeVoto, internal consistency, and translating a 500-page book inside out

• The "legal truth test" for a witness who says he saw an angel: honest, competent, biased, reasonable

• David Whitmer's 1881 Richmond affidavit — and why Alexander Doniphan's signature on it matters

Get Authentic: The Book of Mormon, Evidences of a Miracle by Stephen and Rebecca Lundwall: https://amzn.to/4ww8YrH

Further Readings:

https://www.josephsmithpapers.org/paper-summary/original-manuscript-of-the-book-of-mormon-circa-12-april-1828-circa-1-july-1829/194

https://archive.org/details/addresstoallbeli00whit/page/9/mode/1up

https://scripturecentral.org/archive/books/book-chapter/-gift-and-power-god-0

https://www.josephsmithpapers.org/paper-summary/history-circa-summer-1832/1

https://www.josephsmithpapers.org/paper-summary/printers-manuscript-of-the-book-of-mormon-circa-august-1829-circa-january-1830/1

https://www.josephsmithpapers.org/paper-summary/original-manuscript-of-the-book-of-mormon-circa-12-april-1828-circa-1-july-1829/1

https://www.deseret.com/faith/2026/06/05/church-of-jesus-christ-acquires-daguerreotype-some-say-is-the-only-photo-of-joseph-smith/

Subscribe for more faithful scholarship on the Book of Mormon, Church history, and the ancient world. Study deeply, believe boldly.

===Discover===

If any of our thoughts resonated with you, consider learning more about the single most influential book in our lives.

https://www.discoverbookofmormon.org/

===Content Disclaimer===

The views expressed represent ours alone and do not necessarily reflect the official position of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.

#BookOfMormon #LDS #ComeFollowMe #InformedSaints #JosephSmith #BookOfMormonWitnesses #Moroni #EmmaSmith #OliverCowdery #DavidWhitmer #MartinHarris #RoyalSkousen #GoldPlates #BookOfMormonTranslation #Hebraisms #ChainOfCustody #Provenance #AlexanderDoniphan #LatterDaySaints #StephenLundwall

Did Brigham Young Order the Mountain Meadows Massacre? Jul 26, 2026

Show notes

On September 11, 1857, Latter-day Saints, assisted by a group of Paiutes, killed between 100 and 140 men, women, and children of an Arkansas wagon train at Mountain Meadows in southern Utah. There is no way to soften that. So this episode asks the harder questions head-on: how did a people who had been driven from their own homes commit the worst atrocity in their history; and did Brigham Young order it?

Jasmin Rappleye, Neal Rappleye, and Stephen Smoot sit down with Dr. Casey Griffiths — assistant professor of Church history and doctrine at BYU, co-host of the Church History Matters podcast, and former president of the John Whitmer Historical Association — to walk through the definitive primary-source research: Massacre at Mountain Meadows (Ronald Walker, Richard E. Turley Jr., and Glen Leonard) and Vengeance Is Mine (Richard E. Turley Jr. and Barbara Jones Brown), both from Oxford University Press, along with Casey's What You Don't Know About the 100 Most Important Events in Church History.

===Informed Saints Credits===

Produced by The Ancient America Foundation

Producer: Spencer Clark

Hosts: Stephen Smoot, Neal Rappleye, Jasmin Rappleye

In this episode:

• The Utah War of 1857: why President James Buchanan sent roughly a third of the U.S. Army (~2,500 troops) toward Utah — and why the press branded it "Buchanan's Blunder"

• The Nauvoo Legion's Sebastopol strategy, Lot Smith's famously polite wagon-burnings, and the army's miserable winter at Fort Bridger

• Thomas L. Kane's dash via Panama to broker peace — arriving in Salt Lake on Christmas Day

• The Baker–Fancher party from Arkansas: denied provisions town by town, and the anthrax outbreak near Fillmore that fed poisoning rumors

• What (maybe) happened in Cedar City — and why stake president Isaac Haight sought retribution after the wagon train had already left

• The plan to blame the Paiutes, John D. Lee's role as on-site commander, and William Dame's fateful approval

• James Haslam's ride to Salt Lake and Brigham Young's letter — "let them go in peace" — arriving two days too late

• September 11: the false flag of truce, the "do your duty" signal, and the 17 young children who survived

• The Haight–Dame blow-up at the site, the original letterbook, and why the evidence points away from Brigham Young ordering the massacre

• Trials, a deliberately hung jury, the Pittman-shorthand transcripts, and John D. Lee's execution at Mountain Meadows

• Mormonism Unveiled, Mark Hofmann forgeries, and how the "Brigham Young ordered it" myth persists from Under the Banner of Heaven to American Primeval

• President Henry B. Eyring's 2007 statement at the 150th anniversary — and what facing this history honestly asks of all of us

Go deeper:

Massacre at Mountain Meadows — Walker, Turley & Leonard (Oxford University Press): https://amzn.to/4fsHtYU

Vengeance Is Mine — Turley & Jones Brown (Oxford University Press): https://amzn.to/4yLAQKf

What You Don't Know About the 100 Most Important Events in Church History — Casey Griffiths, Mary Jane Woodger, and Susan Easton Black: https://amzn.to/4fDL7PX

Trial transcripts online (Turley & Jones Brown): https://mountainmeadowsmassacre.com

Church Resources:

https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/study/ensign/2007/09/the-mountain-meadows-massacre?lang=eng

https://history.byu.edu/mountainmeadowsmassacre

Subscribe for more faithful scholarship on Latter-day Saint history and scripture. Study deeply, believe boldly.

===Discover===

If any of our thoughts resonated with you, consider learning more about the single most influential book in our lives.

https://www.discoverbookofmormon.org/

===Content Disclaimer===

The views expressed represent ours alone and do not necessarily reflect the official position of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.

#MountainMeadowsMassacre #MountainMeadows #BrighamYoung #JohnDLee #UtahWar #LDSHistory #ChurchHistory #LatterDaySaints #LDS #MormonHistory #CaseyGriffiths #ChurchHistoryMatters #AmericanHistory #UtahHistory #VengeanceIsMine #AmericanPrimeval #ComeFollowMe #ChurchOfJesusChrist #InformedSaints

What Most Latter-day Saints Miss About Facsimile 2 Jul 19, 2026

Show notes

The facsimiles are the only pictures in Latter-day Saint scripture — and Facsimile 2 is the strangest of them. Critics say Egyptologists translated it long ago and "disproved" the Book of Abraham. Some Saints treat it as secret temple code waiting to be cracked. So what can we actually know about this mysterious circle?

Jasmin Rappleye, Neal Rappleye, and Stephen Smoot sit down with Egyptologist Dr. John Gee (MA, Berkeley; PhD, Yale) — one of the few scholars published on hypocephali in mainstream, peer-reviewed Egyptological venues — and draw on A Guide to the Book of Abraham (BYU Studies), co-authored by Gee, Smoot, Kerry Muhlstein, and John Thompson.

===Informed Saints Credits===

Produced by The Ancient America Foundation

Producer: Spencer Clark

Hosts: Stephen Smoot, Neal Rappleye, Jasmin Rappleye

In this episode:

What a hypocephalus is — and why the Greek "under the head" mistranslates the Egyptian kher-tep, "at the head"
The owner's name on Facsimile 2 — Sheshonq — and why it belonged to a different mummy than Facsimiles 1 and 3
Book of the Dead 162: the "great and secret book" that turns a hypocephalus into a passport through the gates of the next life
The 100+ known hypocephali (Tamás Mekis's catalog) — papyrus, linen, lead, copper, ceramic, and one lost gold disc
Why modern Egyptologists' readings aren't the same as ancient Egyptian interpretations — and Gee's peer-reviewed study of mismatched figure identifications
The one block of text scholars can read — the very figures Joseph Smith said are "to be had in the holy temple of God" — and its parallels on the Ptolemaic temple gate at Karnak
The rim inscription's references to the temple of the Benu bird (the phoenix) at Heliopolis
The missing head and missing quadrant — and whether the published solar bark and two-headed central figure fall within the ancient range
"The great cow who gave birth to the sun": Hathor, Esna, and why identifications shift from city to city
Figure 6, the earth in its four quarters, and the four winds on a Cairo Museum sarcophagus
Why Joseph Smith's journals call this "the astronomical cut" — and the Kolob connection to Abraham 3
How much the facsimiles actually matter: "not the keystone of our religion"

Further Readings:

https://scholarsarchive.byu.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=5293&context=byusq

https://byustudies.byu.edu/issue/61-4

https://www.archaeopress.com/Archaeopress/Products/9781789693331

https://www.magicgatebg.com/Books/Joseph%20Smith%20Hypocephalus.pdf

https://scholarsarchive.byu.edu/byusq/vol17/iss3/2/

https://www.deseretbook.com/product/5033745.html?srsltid=AfmBOorIWyDxSEgPvDjozuGpTfW85jWOEiYsTguXkryo8GKAMTQfBCEt

https://interpreterfoundation.org/journal/temple-themes-in-the-book-of-abraham

===Discover===

If any of our thoughts resonated with you, consider learning more about the single most influential book in our lives.

https://www.discoverbookofmormon.org/

===Content Disclaimer===

The views expressed represent ours alone and do not necessarily reflect the official position of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.

#BookOfAbraham #Facsimile2 #Hypocephalus #JosephSmith #PearlOfGreatPrice #Egyptology #JohnGee #AncientEgypt #BookOfTheDead #Kolob #Karnak #Heliopolis #JosephSmithPapyri #LDS #LatterDaySaints #ChurchOfJesusChrist #ComeFollowMe #BookOfMormon #LDSScholarship #InformedSaints

What Most Readers Miss About the Sword of Laban Jul 12, 2026

Show notes

Critics once called the Book of Mormon's weapons a fatal flaw — steel swords in 600 BC? Scimitars a thousand years before Muhammad? Bows and arrows in ancient America? Then archaeology started coming into play.

In this episode, Jasmin Rappleye, Neal Rappleye, and Stephen Smoot dig into Matthew Roper's Anachronisms: Accidental Evidence for the Book of Mormon, published through the Interpreter Foundation — an exhaustive documentation of weapons critics once claimed couldn't have existed.

===Informed Saints Credits===

Produced by The Ancient America Foundation

Producer: Spencer Clark

Hosts: Stephen Smoot, Neal Rappleye, Jasmin Rappleye

In this episode:

Roper's scorecard: 12 of 15 allegedly anachronistic weapons now confirmed, 2 partially confirmed
The sword of Laban (1 Nephi 4) and the critics — Clark Braden (1884), a 1964 Notre Dame Press book, Walter Martin's Kingdom of the Cults (1997) — who insisted steel didn't exist in Nephi's day
The meter-long steel sword discovered by Avraham Eitan at a fortress near Jericho, dated to the late 7th century BC
King Tut's meteoric-iron, gold-hilted dagger and other gold-hilted weapons of the ancient Near East
Why "steel" in the Book of Ether may reflect layers of translation — and why the King James Bible renders Hebrew bronze as "steel"
The macuahuitl: the obsidian-edged Mesoamerican sword conquistadors said cut better than Spanish steel (Ross Hassig, Michael Coe) — going back to Olmec San Lorenzo
Scimitars from Enos to the Egyptian khopesh, the Hebrew kidon, Goliath's weapons in 1 Samuel 17, and curved blades on the Lachish reliefs
Curved blades in the New World: Tonina, Teotihuacan, and San Lorenzo
Nephi's steel bow, the "bow of steel" of 2 Samuel 22:35 / Psalm 18, and composite bows with metal fittings
Bows, arrows, and atlatls in ancient Mesoamerica — and what a 2005 Copán study changed

Further Readings:

Read the primary source: Matthew Roper, Anachronisms: Accidental Evidence for the Book of Mormon

https://scripturecentral.org/evidence/book-of-mormon-evidence-bow-and-arrow

https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/ancient-mesoamerica/article/classic-maya-warfare-and-weapons-spear-dart-and-arrow-points-of-aguateca-and-copan/8E310349816CEA249F7A7A6095A90B4C

https://scripturecentral.org/archive/books/book-chapter/bow-and-arrow-book-mormon

https://www.ebsco.com/research-starters/arts-and-entertainment/atlatl

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0278416522000794

https://scholarsarchive.byu.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1205&context=jbms

https://scripturecentral.org/evidence/book-of-mormon-evidence-cimeters

https://scripturecentral.org/knowhy/why-does-the-book-of-mormon-mention-cimeters

https://scholarsarchive.byu.edu/jbms/vol5/iss1/7/

https://scripturecentral.org/knowhy/what-kinds-of-swords-did-book-of-mormon-peoples-use

https://interpreterfoundation.org/journal/lehi-the-smelter-new-light-on-lehis-profession

https://interpreterfoundation.org/blog-the-hilt-thereof-was-of-pure-gold

https://interpreterfoundation.org/journal/anachronisms-accidental-evidence-in-book-of-mormon-criticisms-chapter-2-warfare-in-the-book-of-mormon

https://interpreterfoundation.org/journal/anachronisms-accidental-evidence-in-book-of-mormon-criticisms-introduction

Subscribe for more faithful scholarship every week. Study deeply, believe boldly.

===Discover===

If any of our thoughts resonated with you, consider learning more about the single most influential book in our lives.

https://www.discoverbookofmormon.org/

===Content Disclaimer===

The views expressed represent ours alone and do not necessarily reflect the official position of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.

#BookOfMormon #LDS #ComeFollowMe #InformedSaints #BookOfMormonEvidence #Anachronisms #SwordOfLaban #Macuahuitl #Nephi #AncientAmerica #Mesoamerica #BiblicalArchaeology #Archaeology #LatterDaySaints #Scimitar #AztecWarfare #MatthewRoper #Jericho #ScriptureStudy #FaithAndScholarship

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