Ever since the Church released photos of Joseph Smith's brown seer stonelast year, the LDS community has been buzzing about the topic. But thebrown seer stone wasn't Joseph Smith's only seer stone, or his most cherished. He also had a white seer stone.
In a recentLDS Perspectives Podcast interview, Dr. Michael Mackay demonstrates that these stones were used for much more than translating the Book of Mormon. They were used to help in translating the Bible, dictating revelations, and even giving patriarchal blessings.
Interpreters like these seer stones were discovered with the Gold Plates along with a breastplate.
"This one is really a mystery. I have done more research on the breastplate than anything, and I've been left dry. . . . Where does its origination come from? The stones [Joseph Smith] gets with the Gold Plates come with the breastplate, and those are the three things: the plates, the breastplate, and the Nephite interpreters, Mosiah the Second's interpreters that are bound together with a metal figure eight," Dr. Mackay shares.
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Though the exact purpose of the breastplate isn't clear, Dr. Mackay shares clues into what it looked like, quoting Lucy Mack Smith when she remarked, "I got to hold the breastplate covered in a handkerchief," a fact that demonstrates it must have been relatively small.
Find out more about the functions of these sacred artifacts and how they helped in the translation of the Book of Mormon with this fascinating podcast.
Lead image from Joseph Smith Papers.
Discover more fascinating facts inJoseph Smith's Seer Stones.
This book discusses the origins of Joseph Smith's seer stones and explores how Joseph used them throughout his life in a way that goes beyond translating the Book of Mormon. It also traces the provenance of his stones once they left his possession. The authors examine how the Book of Mormon itself provides a storyline about the history of seer stones and how this helped Joseph Smith learn about his own prophetic gifts.
