FAIR
Spalding manuscript theory
FAIR Latter-day Saints
When you actually have Spaulding’s romance, the plot, names, theology, and style are not the Book of Mormon. Rigdon did not meet Joseph until after 1830. The theory survives as folklore because ‘he must have copied something’ is psychologically cheaper than ‘he translated a book.’
A lost second manuscript is not evidence. It is a refusal to let the first manuscript speak.
- The recovered Spaulding text is a Roman-Americans tale, not 1 Nephi–Moroni.
- Witnesses of the dictation describe Joseph looking in a hat, not reading a novel.
- Every generation’s ‘real source’ (Spaulding, View of the Hebrews, The Late War, a hidden genius) cannot all be the one source.