LDS Inoculation - Good or Bad?

[Tex]

Originally Posted by Adam

1. The First Vision was a personal experience for Joseph and not the foundation for the Church. It wasn't even widely known about by members of the Church in Joseph's day. ... If we are going to have a lesson on the First Vision and ignore the personal nature of the visit and pretend it was a core part of the Restoration then that lesson will be a "sanitized" version of the story--meaning not intended to be fully understood.

Originally Posted by Adam

• Think about how Joseph Smith provides an example for us as we seek answers to our questions. As you study his account of the First Vision, what do you learn about reading the scriptures? about pondering? about prayer?

My answer: Very little. That young kids can read a verse out of the bible and go pray and God will appear to them? This story is a one-off, an Alma the Younger conversion story. It ain't going to happen to me or my kids. It is of very limited applicability. And it has nothing to do with the restoration of the Chruch.

Originally Posted by Adam

Just because the Joseph theophany has become the centerpiece of the first discussion (due to its theatrical effect), doesn't mean it is core doctrine.

From JS manual, Chapter 2, "God the Eternal Father":

Joseph’s faithful prayer for mercy and wisdom was answered with the First Vision. That vision gave the young Prophet far greater knowledge about God than any of the churches of his day possessed, knowledge that had been lost to the world for centuries. In the First Vision, Joseph learned for himself that the Father and the Son are individual beings, that Their power is greater than the power of evil, and that man is indeed fashioned in God’s image—truths that are essential in understanding our actual relationship to our Father in Heaven.

[Tex]

Originally Posted by Adam

I agree that a basic knowledge of the Godhead and their power is essential in understanding our relationship to our Father in Heaven. The First Vision wasn't neccessary to learn these things. Further, the First Vision wasn't the vehicle to teach these things until after the 1920s.

I'm scratching my head at this logic. It's like saying the shots at Concord didn't matter because the real victories were at Saratoga and Yorktown.

Originally Posted by Adam

Can you understand that while the story does teach some true doctrines, the story itself isn't core. By analogy, DC 132 teaches the importance of fidelity in marriage, the reality of continuing revelation, and the historicracy of Abraham, Issac and Jacob and other biblical characters. All these are wonderful and key items. But the Joseph Smith manual leaves out a lesson on Joseph Smith's self-percieved crowing doctrine because it isn't applicable to our day.

Then it goes on to start with the First Vision, and justifies its inclusion by saying that collaterally it teaches some very key doctrines. The same could be said and done with plural marriage. But we don't want to go there.

Someday you and others like you are going to have to get past your polygamy complex. I amazed at how it can tangentially be tied into just about any religious discussion on this board. The church moved on about 100 years ago. Why don't you join us?

Originally Posted by Adam

None of the Kirtland or Zion converts even knew about the First Vision and only very few of the Nauvoo converts heard the story. Don't pretend now that the experience itself is somehow core doctrine. Yes, yes, we learn a few truths in dicta, some beautiful truths that could be learned from Stephen's stoning account in the NT and other existing scriptures.

I'll have to do some research on this claim, but even if it is true: so what? Why does the dissemination of the First Vision story among early church converts make it decisive on its importance and impact to the restoration? None of the Kirtland or Zion converts had a copy of our Doctrine and Covenants, or our Pearl of Great Price. Shall we discard those as scripture?

Are you saying that one can learn about the nature of God from other places than the First Vision? Obviously. Crack open D&C 130. Of course, that wasn't revealed to the Kirtland or Zion converts either, so I guess it doesn't meet your criteria.

[pelagius]

Originally Posted by Tex

I'll have to do some research on this claim, but even if it is true: so what? Why does the dissemination of the First Vision story among early church converts make it decisive on its importance and impact to the restoration? None of the Kirtland or Zion converts had a copy of our Doctrine and Covenants, or our Pearl of Great Price. Shall we discard those as scripture?

Tex, I don't have a pony in this argument. I haven't even paid close attention. However, I thought the following my be a helpful. I think Adam my be referring to the following article:

The Significance of Joseph Smith's "First Vision" in Mormon Thought, Dialogue, 1966.

http://content.lib.utah.edu/cdm4/doc...PTR=3783&REC=3

[Archaea]

Originally Posted by pelagius

Tex, I don't have a pony in this argument. I haven't even paid close attention. However, I thought the following my be a helpful. I think Adam my be referring to the following article:

The Significance of Joseph Smith's "First Vision" in Mormon Thought, Dialogue, 1966.

http://content.lib.utah.edu/cdm4/doc...PTR=3783&REC=3

I don't know if I've ever read that article before, but for something written in 1966, it was amazingly candid and well-done. It must have been the springboard that later generations used to understand the evolution of the First Vision.

If you combine this with the first few chapters of Bushman, you have a nice outline.

[pelagius]

Originally Posted by Archaea

I don't know if I've ever read that article before, but for something written in 1966, it was amazingly candid and well-done. It must have been the springboard that later generations used to understand the evolution of the First Vision.

If you combine this with the first few chapters of Bushman, you have a nice outline.

This is fairly geeky but for those that are technically inclined you might like it. The following is a perl script that will download the dialogue article and convert the article to a pdf.

#!/usr/bin/perl

my $base = "http://content.lib.utah.edu/cgi-bin/getimage.exe?" .
           "CISOROOT=/dialogue&CISOPTR=";
my $size = "&DMWIDTH=1024&DMHEIGHT=1600";
my $beg = 3611;
my $end = 3628;

for (my $i=$beg; $i <= $end; ++$i) {
  system(wget,"$base$i\&DMWIDTH=1024&DMHEIGHT=1600");
  system(convert,"getimage.exe?CISOROOT=%2Fdialogue&CISOPTR=$i$size",
         "foo$i.gif");
  system(rm,"getimage.exe?CISOROOT=%2Fdialogue&CISOPTR=$i$size");
}

system(convert,"foo*.gif","foo.pdf");
for (my $i=$beg; $i <= $end; ++$i) {
  system(rm,"foo$i.gif");
}

It should work on most Unix systems. I think it will work on a OS X, but not 100% sure. I wrote it on my linux box.

[Solon]

Originally Posted by RockyBalboa

Jay has a vagina. Not a surprise.

Rocky, Stating that someone has a vagina isn't a very good insult. It's misogynistic and probably pisses off female readers.

I suggest you state someone is a vagina; or, better yet, a different, non-gendered body part (like asshole or armpit or something).

[Jeff Lebowski]

Originally Posted by pelagius

This is fairly geeky but for those that are technically inclined you might like it. The following is a perl script that will download the dialogue article and convert the article to a pdf.

#!/usr/bin/perl
 
my $base = "http://content.lib.utah.edu/cgi-bin/getimage.exe?" .
           "CISOROOT=/dialogue&CISOPTR=";
my $size = "&DMWIDTH=1024&DMHEIGHT=1600";
my $beg = 3611;
my $end = 3628;
 
for (my $i=$beg; $i <= $end; ++$i) {
  system(wget,"$base$i\&DMWIDTH=1024&DMHEIGHT=1600");
  system(convert,"getimage.exe?CISOROOT=%2Fdialogue&CISOPTR=$i$size",
         "foo$i.gif");
  system(rm,"getimage.exe?CISOROOT=%2Fdialogue&CISOPTR=$i$size");
}
 
system(convert,"foo*.gif","foo.pdf");
for (my $i=$beg; $i <= $end; ++$i) {
  system(rm,"foo$i.gif");
}

It should work on most Unix systems. I think it will work on a OS X, but not 100% sure. I wrote it on my linux box.

Awesome.

[pelagius]

Originally Posted by Jeff Lebowski

Awesome.

Jeff you can download any article and convert it to a pdf by just changing the following:

my $beg = 3611;
my $end = 3628;

Which are the beginning and ending page numbers and are listed in the URL for each page. They pdf is fairly large because it is just concatinating the images of each page but it is much more readable than the website and it prints out nicely. It does need the "convert" and "wget" commands to work since it calls both.

[Archaea]

Originally Posted by pelagius

Jeff you can download any article and convert it to a pdf by just changing the following:

my $beg = 3611;
my $end = 3628;

Which are the beginning and ending page numbers and are listed in the URL for each page. They pdf is fairly large because it is just concatinating the images of each page but it is much more readable than the website and it prints out nicely. It does need the "convert" and "wget" commands to work since it calls both.

How about something working on a Windows system XP or higher?

Concatenating, I like that word. Isn't it spelled with an "e" though?

[Tex]

Originally Posted by Archaea

How about something working on a Windows system XP or higher?

Concatenating, I like that word. Isn't it spelled with an "e" though?

The code he posted will work on a Windows XP system as long as you have a Perl interpreter installed. ActiveState (www.activestate.com) provides one.