The Book of Mormon will not stop telling you where the record is. Who's holding it. Who handed it off. What they did with it and why. A retired trial attorney read that and recognized something from thirty years in courtrooms: a chain of custody.
Jasmin Rappleye, Neal Rappleye, and Stephen Smoot sit down with Stephen Lundwall: retired IP and business attorney and former BYU religion faculty, to talk about Authentic: The Book of Mormon, Evidences of a Miracle, written with his wife Rebecca Lundwall and published by Deseret Book. Lundwall makes the case the way he'd make it to a jury: witnesses, exhibits, cross-examination, and a closing argument.
===Informed Saints Credits===
Produced by The Ancient America Foundation
Producer: Spencer Clark
Hosts: Stephen Smoot, Neal Rappleye, Jasmin Rappleye
In this episode:
• What "provenance" means, and why archaeologists and attorneys care about the same thing
• Why Moroni being the final author of the record changes everything about the handoff
• Isaac Taylor's 1827 argument that ancient literature, history, and religion all rest on secure transmission — published the same year Moroni delivered the plates
• What the original and printer's manuscripts actually show, and why the translation itself is evidence
• Elizabeth Whitmer and Emma Smith on what they watched happen day after day
• The interruptions Joseph never needed read back to him
• The 28 words in Joseph Smith's own handwriting — the only ones in the entire manuscript
• How Oliver Cowdery learned to spell Coriantumr
• The Hebraic "if–and" conditional in Moroni 10:4 that Joseph edited out of later editions
• Bernard DeVoto, internal consistency, and translating a 500-page book inside out
• The "legal truth test" for a witness who says he saw an angel: honest, competent, biased, reasonable
• David Whitmer's 1881 Richmond affidavit — and why Alexander Doniphan's signature on it matters
Get Authentic: The Book of Mormon, Evidences of a Miracle by Stephen and Rebecca Lundwall: https://amzn.to/4ww8YrH
Further Readings:
https://www.josephsmithpapers.org/paper-summary/original-manuscript-of-the-book-of-mormon-circa-12-april-1828-circa-1-july-1829/194
https://archive.org/details/addresstoallbeli00whit/page/9/mode/1up
https://scripturecentral.org/archive/books/book-chapter/-gift-and-power-god-0
https://www.josephsmithpapers.org/paper-summary/history-circa-summer-1832/1
https://www.josephsmithpapers.org/paper-summary/printers-manuscript-of-the-book-of-mormon-circa-august-1829-circa-january-1830/1
https://www.josephsmithpapers.org/paper-summary/original-manuscript-of-the-book-of-mormon-circa-12-april-1828-circa-1-july-1829/1
https://www.deseret.com/faith/2026/06/05/church-of-jesus-christ-acquires-daguerreotype-some-say-is-the-only-photo-of-joseph-smith/
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Chapters
- (00:00:00) - How Authentic Is the Book of Mormon?
- (00:00:41) - The Book of Mormon: Its Provenance
- (00:06:14) - The Book of Mormon's Historical Antiquity
- (00:12:31) - Exhibit A
- (00:17:41) - The Book of Mormon Case
- (00:23:25) - If Then, If Then in the Book of Mormon
- (00:26:08) - What about internal consistency in the Book of Mormon?
- (00:32:44) - Joseph Smith vs the Missouri Juror
- (00:38:29) - Sam Lundwall makes closing statement for the case for authenticity of the Book of Mormon
