Category Archives: Mormonism

Doubling Down on Diversionary Polemics: Robert Boylan’s Response on Moroni’s Move

Posted on May 31, 2020 by robbowman

As I expected, Boylan issued a hasty “response” to the previous post in which he failed to address any of the substantive issues I presented there. Instead, he engaged in a poorly done tu quoque (“you too”) fallacious argument. First, … Continue reading →

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Moroni’s Marvelous Move from Mesoamerica to Manchester

Posted on May 29, 2020 by robbowman

Robert Boylan, a Mormon apologist blogger, has written a series of blistering attack posts attempting to discredit my book Jesus’ Resurrection and Joseph’s Visions. Boylan has described it as a “joke of a book”[1] and a “mess of a book,”[2] … Continue reading →

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Christianity vs Mormonism: Atheist Bob Seidensticker Cross-Examined

Posted on May 22, 2020 by robbowman

Bob Seidensticker is an atheist with a blog at Patheos called Cross Examined. Two days ago (May 20, 2020), another atheist blogger at Patheos, Jonathan M.S. Pearce, posted “Using Common Sense to Not See God: Christianity versus Mormonism,” part of … Continue reading →

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Mrs. Palmer and the First Vision: Doing Research Mormon Apologists Won’t Do

Posted on April 24, 2020 by robbowman

Serious historical investigation of the First Vision, Joseph Smith’s story of seeing the Father and the Son in the spring of 1820, properly focuses on Joseph’s own multiple accounts of the vision as well as the other accounts from Joseph’s … Continue reading →

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Suppression of Documents: Joseph Smith’s 1832 First Vision Account versus the Noncanonical Gospels

Posted on April 18, 2020 by robbowman

The second article in the recent Book of Mormon Central (BMC) series of “Insights” on the First Vision is entitled “The 1832 First Vision Account.” In that account, Joseph reported seeing only “the Lord” Jesus, not of the Father and … Continue reading →

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Four Contrasts between Joseph Smith’s Four First Vision Accounts and the Four Gospels

Posted on April 16, 2020 by robbowman

The first article in the recent Book of Mormon Central “Insight” series provides an overview of “Joseph Smith’s Firsthand Accounts of the First Vision.” These include the 1838/1839 canonical account in Joseph Smith–History (part of the collection known as the … Continue reading →

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The Last Word Has Not Been Spoken on the First Vision

Posted on April 16, 2020 by robbowman

According to the beliefs of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (LDS), in the early spring of 1820 the Father and the Son appeared to their founder Joseph Smith Jr. when he was a boy. At its General … Continue reading →

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Did the First Vision of Joseph Smith Happen 200 Years Ago?

Posted on March 27, 2020 by robbowman

Some Mormons believe that yesterday—March 26, 2020—marked the 200-year anniversary of the First Vision, in which Joseph Smith saw the Father and the Son in the woods near his home. If the First Vision had taken place in the spring … Continue reading →

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Did Moses Literally See the Face of God?

Posted on June 24, 2019 by robbowman

Exodus 33:11 says that the Lord spoke “face to face” with Moses, but Exodus 33:20 says that Moses could not see the Lord’s face. Is this a contradiction? Two preliminary observations may be helpful. First, we should notice that Exodus … Continue reading →

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Joseph Smith and the Many Wives of David and Solomon: Authorized or Abominable?

Posted on May 28, 2019 by robbowman

In all of the debate over Joseph Smith’s teachings and practices regarding polygamy, little attention seems to have been given to an explicit contradiction in his scriptural revelations. This contradiction concerns what the Lord thought of David and Solomon having … Continue reading →

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