Without Fault
by Ray Farmer

Says You: Book of Mormon authors themselves also admitted their own susceptibility to err (1 Nephi 19:6; 2 Nephi 33:11; 3 Nephi 23:12-13; Mormon 8:12, 16-17; 9:31; Ether 12:23-25) and even the Book of Mormon title page admits, "if there are faults they are the mistakes of men; wherefore condemn not the things of God....” Mormons do not believe the Book of Mormon to be perfect or infallible...

Says Me: I think of three references to the documents under consideration. There is "the Book", the "words of the Book" and then the 19th century printing and publication of the Book of Mormon.

“The Book” refers to the plates Joseph Smith used to translate. The “Words of the Book” is the portion that Joseph Smith translated. And then there is the printed version first seen in 1830.

“The Book” we know is without error and is perfect and infallible doctrinally. We know this because Jesus actually asked to see the record and made only one correction, which was immediately remedied. All other doctrine was left as it was.

We know the “Words of the Book” are, like “the Book”, translated “by the Gift and Power of God”, perfect and infallible. Even the Book of Mormon in print is doctrinally perfect or infallible up until recently. People have added "or out of the waters of baptism" in 1 Nephi 20:1 and, probably out of fear changed "white" to "pure". Certainly nobody can go so far as saying "Much of what was recorded by those prophets was based on an Old Testament misunderstanding of God and his Son and ancient Israelite views of heaven, hell, and God’s plan of salvation". That would be declaring that “The Book”, the “Words of the Book” and the print edition are not correct, reliable or truthful.

Jacob 6

8. Behold, will ye reject these words? Will ye reject the words of the prophets; and will ye reject all the words which have been spoken concerning Christ, after so many have spoken concerning him; and deny the good word of Christ, and the power of God, and the gift of the Holy Ghost, and quench the Holy Spirit, and make a mock of the great plan of redemption, which hath been laid for you?
9. Know ye not that if ye will do these things, that the power of the redemption and the resurrection, which is in Christ, will bring you to stand with shame and awful guilt before the bar of God?
10. And according to the power of justice, for justice cannot be denied, ye must go away into that lake of fire and brimstone, whose flames are unquenchable, and whose smoke ascendeth up forever and ever, which lake of fire and brimstone is endless torment.

I looked up the verses you put forth to prove the mistakes found in the Book of Mormon. They really do not prove the doctrine is fallible. Lets look at your first reference (I added some important pieces that you left out)

1 Nephi 19:6-7

Nevertheless, I do not write anything upon plates save it be that I think it be sacred. And now, if I do err, even did they err of old; not that I would excuse myself because of other men, but because of the weakness which is in me, according to the flesh, I would excuse myself.
For the things which some men esteem to be of great worth, both to the body and soul, others set at naught and trample under their feet. Yea, even the very God of Israel do men trample under their feet; I say, trample under their feet but I would speak in other words--they set him at naught, and hearken not to the voice of his counsels.

The error that Nephi feared was in making a selection of things to include. We see this when he declares "I do not write anything upon plates save it be that I think it be sacred. And now, if I do err....". We see his instruction to Jacob along these lines. Says Jocob, "Nephi gave me, Jacob, a commandment concerning the small plates, upon which these things are engraven. And he gave me, Jacob, a commandment that I should write upon these plates a few of the things which I considered to be most precious; that I should not touch, save it were lightly, concerning the history".

Somewhere you have pointed out, "teachings such as an understanding of the Spirit World, the pre-mortal existence of man, baptism by proxy for the dead, the unity of the Godhead, and many modern doctrines, are not discussed. Some see these as conflicting teachings, others see them as reflecting a more limited and incomplete view of the gospel in its fulness". Now we see that, if these were actual doctrines, for some reason the Prophets left them out. If these things were true and sacred, they would have been included. So the True Prophets say they will "not write anything upon plates save it be that I think it be sacred".

Strange to say, although Jacob left out “unique LDS doctrine”, he did think a couple chapters against multiple wives was, in his opinion, among the “few” sacred things he addressed in his limited space because that would be important to those who would carry the “Words of the Book” to church and on missionary exploits!

Jacob had two problems. The first was the difficulty the Nephite Prophets had in the physical act of engraving.

Jacob 4:1 I cannot write but a little of my words, because of the difficulty of engraving our words upon plates) and we know that the things which we write upon plates must remain;....we can write a few words upon plates...

This difficulty was, in fact, divine intervention. "And thou hast made us that we could write but little, because of the awkwardness of our hands" (Ether 12:24). Simply put, it appears the Lord did not want to flood the world with a bunch of "other books". Rather, He put the fulness of the Gospel into two reletively short books that, with small effort and cost, can be mastered by anyone. The point is that the Prophets were concerned that they would leave something out or put in useless information. Hence they expressed their unfounded trepidation.

Another problem the Prophets faced was the limited space on the plates.

Jarom 1:2 And as these plates are small....wherefore, it must needs be that I write a little;

In 1 Nephi 8:30 Nephi says, "But, to be short in writing,...." but goes on to assure us in 1 Nephi 14:30....if all the things which I saw are not written, the things which I have written are true. And thus it is. Amen". Furthermore, we are told in 2 Nephi 2:27 "....men are free according to the flesh; and all things are given them which are expedient unto man" despite necessary brevity.

Eventually they completely ran out of space on the available ore.

Omni 1:30 ....these plates are full. And I make an end of my speaking.

Related to the limited space that plates provided, the Prophets who were powerful in speech, were required, not only to scratch out their words, but had to use a language whose characters were less space intensive. This also concerned them.

Mormon 9:33 And if our plates had been sufficiently large we should have written in Hebrew; but the Hebrew hath been altered by us also; and if we could have written in Hebrew, behold, ye would have had no imperfection in our record.

I am sure had I been able to speak my native tongue in Italy on my mission I could have preached with better words, figures, metaphors, similes, local slang, idioms and more. Instead, my vocabulary was limited and I, nevertheless, got my message out however linguistically flawed. I am sure I mispronounced, conjugated verbs disastrously, and chose words that, although conveyed the meaning, were not quite right. For example, if I were talking about a dead body, I could call it a stiff or remains. Although both mean the same thing, only one would be appropriate when whispering kind words to a widow at graveside. Expressions can be less than perfect when expressing perfect doctrine. If I had someone there who could translate my teachings, like Joseph had the Gift and Power of God, this kind person would be able to give a better rendition of my true message. Certainly, translators don't translate word for word as spoken but adopt the translation to reflect intent.

Thus Nephi could confidently declare, "Christ will show unto you, with power and great glory, that they are his words, at the last day; and you and I shall stand face to face before his bar; and ye shall know that I have been commanded of him to write these things, notwithstanding my weakness" (Nephi 33:11). He knew "The words of the Book" would spring from the ground and that God Himself "shall bring this thing to light; for it shall be brought out of darkness unto light, according to the word of God; yea, it shall be brought out of the earth, and it shall shine forth out of darkness, and come unto the knowledge of the people; and it shall be done by the power of God”.

And if there be faults they be the faults of a man. But behold, we know no fault; nevertheless God knoweth all things; therefore, he that condemneth, let him be aware lest he shall be in danger of hell fire" (Mormon 8:12, 16-7).

Finally, Mormon depicts the judgement where we will stand face to face with Mormon as the Great Judge says to you, "Did I not declare my words unto you, which were written by this man". The Lord is referring to the "Words of the Book" printed in the Book of Mormon. We will also see Nephi at the Judgement seat. He says "ye shall know that I have been commanded of him to write these things, notwithstanding my weakness" Thus God, Nephi and Mormon will tell those who believe the Book of Mormon "as far as it is translated correctly" or that it is full of the “misunderstandings of Old Testament concepts”, "we know no fault".

Finally, do you think the Gift and Power of God would not correct all of these doctrinal errors and admissions in the translation process? Let us pretend that there are thousands upon thousands of errors written by the Nephite Prophets as they scratched away. Do you really think that the lines appearing to Joseph as he dictated to his scribes, that the Power of God would not make any corrections? Joseph, apparently, did not translate character by character but rather read the words as they divinely appeared line by line. Would God continuously say "Oh wow, that's messed up. Oh well. Let it stand as it is"?

No, this non-Mormon believes that the Book of Mormon is infallible as written. He also marvels whenever he has to defend the "Words of the Book" against all the attacks by those who wave it in everyone's face, declaring they "know it is true".