All three of the Three Witnesses concur. Cumorah is Cumorah. Why when we accept their word as to the authenticity of the Golden Plates and Book of Mormon, do we not accept their word that Cumorah is indeed Cumorah? Oliver Cowdery, David Whitmer, and Martin Harris are the Three Witnesses of the Book of Mormon. They are 'our' eye witnesses. And each one of them concur in their accounts that the Hill Cumorah of the Book of Mormon is the Hill Cumorah in New York where the plates where brought forth by Moroni and given to the Prophet Joseph Smith. Certainly Oliver, David, and Martin would have heard the common every day references to the Hill Cumorah given by the Prophet Joseph Smith. Oliver, like Parley P. Pratt gives as his missionary testimony that the Angel Moroni is the one who called the hill Cumorah in representing it to the prophet and even perhaps likely even to the three witnesses. Yet such first hand 'eye witnesses' are ignored when it comes down to modern day academic dissection of the Book of Mormon according to the 'learned' minds of a number of those in the church today.
The 'Ivory Tower' of scholarly learning and their 'pragmatic' learned dissection and analysis of matters once held as common knowledge amongst the leadership of the Church, often points an accusing finger of historical manipulation by those who have been in 'power' in the Church hierarchy. So as to Martin Harris' word that Cumorah is Cumorah, we will look to an independent source outside of the accused realm of Church History manipulation. This manipulation is claimed by those who claim Cumorah not to be Cumorah. They point a finger of accusation to manipulation of history by the likes of B. H. Roberts and Joseph Fielding Smith. But what does an independent have to gain, one which was never a party to such manipulation either on the one hand or the other?
An Impression of MARTIN HARRIS
FROM THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF CHARLES BUTLER
By FRANCIS HOVEY STODDARD
It was that Bible which was written on golden plates by Jacob the brother of Nephi, Enos the son of Jacob, Jarom the son of Enos, Omni the son of Jarom, Mormon the son of Omni, and Moroni the son of Mormon. In the years 384 A. D., said Mr. Harris, after the great battle on the hill Cumorah, in what is now western New York , Moroni, one of the few survivors, became a wanderer; and in A. D. 420 he sealed up the golden plates on which the records of God's promises were written and hid them in the hill. There they had lain until a little while before, when divine inspiration had come to Joseph Smith, a young man living in Palmyra, directing him to go to a certain hill in the town of Manchester, this same ancient hill of Cumorah, just south of Palmyra, and there to dig in the earth until he came to these plates, the books of the Bible of Mormon, the son of Omni. Joseph Smith had gone, said Mr. Harris, and there he found the golden plates, thin tablets about eight inches long by seven wide, bound together by three rings, engraved on each side in hieroglyphics in a dialect of ancient Egyptian, not then known upon the earth. With these plates the angel of the Lord had helped Joseph Smith to find also the Urim and Thummim, the two transparent stones in silver bows, through which Smith, the inspired prophet, could read and interpret the writings. This was the book that Martin Harris wished to publish, the famous Mormon Bible, documentary basis of a religion noted in later days, and still of importance in at least one western state.
. . .
CHARLES BUTLER lived from 1802 to 1897—a contemporary on the American scene of the early leaders of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. He was an eminent American lawyer, financier, and philanthropist, active in the development of western railroads, and in charitable and educational institutions, being the founder of the Union Theological Seminary. His life and letters were the subject of a book by Francis Hovey Stoddard, published by Scribner's in 1903, and it is from this work that we quote, with the permission of the publisher, this excerpt giving an account of an interview with Martin Harris.
(An Impression of Martin Harris, Improvement Era, 1940, Vol. Xliii. November, 1940. No. 11. .)
One might ask, why should Martin Harris know of such things? That answer is quite compelling in and of itself. Martin Harris was Joseph Smith's scribe of the translation of the first 116 pages of the Book of Mormon. Having such privileged status as having conversations with the Prophet, having heard whatever Mormon's own preface summary was to the planned opening of Mormon's abridgement, and to 116 pages of text not seen nor heard by any others, Martin was in a strategic position to know of many things and things which no other but the Prophet Joseph Smith would have known. In preparing to find finances for the publication of the Book of Mormon, Martin apparently shared a small part of his knowledge concerning the Book of Mormon from his background and experience as the scribe of the first 116 pages of the book and his associations with the Prophet Joseph Smith and what Joseph may have further conveyed to Martin. It therefore seems very significant that Martin Harris would so plainly and clearly identify the hill in New York as the ancient Hill of Cumorah of the Book of Mormon. Where else but from the Prophet and the book itself would Martin have gotten such knowledge?
Now once again, if Oliver Cowdery says so, and David Whitmer says so, and if Martin Harris says so, then why do some in the Chruch today not accept it as being so? The logic makes reason stare as to why when all three witnesses to the Book of Mormon hold to the same story concerning the Hill Cumorah, why should anyone choose to doubt?
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