Saturday
Mar262011
Thomas Stuart Ferguson
Thomas Stuart Ferguson founded the New World Archaeological Foundation (NWAF), which was financed by the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints to perform archaeological research for Book of Mormon evidences and became part of BYU. After 17 fruitless years Ferguson lost his testimony.
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Ferguson lost his testimony in the Book of Mormon:
...you can't set Book of Mormon geography down anywhere — because it is fictional and will never meet the requirements of the dirt-archaeology. I should say — what is in the ground will never confirm to what is in the book.
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Ferguson lost his testimony in the Book of Abraham:
By study of the GRAMMAR, the recovered papyrus, and the illustrations, it is perfectly obvious that we now have the original manuscript material used by Jos. Smith in working up the Book of Abraham. Prof. Klaus Bear of Univ. of Chicago, Prof. Lutz of U.C. (Berkeley), Prof. Lesko (U.C. Berkeley) and Egyptologist Dee Jay Nelson, all agree that the original manuscript Egyptian text translates into the Breathing Permit of Hor (Egyptian God)...
Joseph Smith announced, in print (History of the Church, Vol. II, page 236) that "one of the rolls contained the writings of Abraham, another the writings of Joseph of Egypt..." Since 4 scholars, who have established that they can read Egyptian, say that the manuscripts deal with neither Abraham nor Joseph--and since the 4 reputable men tell us exactly what the manuscripts do say -- I must conclude that Joseph Smith had not the remotest skill in things Egyptian-hieroglyphics. -
Ferguson lost his testimony in Joseph Smith:
I lost faith in Joseph Smith as one having a pipeline to deity... So I give Joseph Smith credit as an innovator and as a smart fellow... I think that Joseph Smith may have had View of the Hebrews from which to work... Oliver Cowdery was in Ethan Smith's [author of View of the Hebrews] congregation before he went from Vermont to New York to join Joseph Smith.
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Ferguson lost his testimony in the LDS church:
Mormonism is probably the best conceived myth-fraternity to which one can belong... Perhaps you and I have been spoofed by Joseph Smith... The day will probably come--but it is far off--when the leadership of the Church will change the excommunication rules and delete as grounds non-belief in the 2 books mentioned and in Joseph Smith as a prophetic etc... but if you wait for that day, you probably will have died. It is a long way off...
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