Talk:Laban (Book of Mormon)

Proposed Split
The portions (sections) of this article that describe the Brass Plates in detail should be transcribed to the article Brass Plates. Reasons given:
 * The stated purpose of this article is to describe the person Laban and thus the in-depth description of the Brass Plates belongs in a separate article.
 * The article Brass Plates was incomplete and the contents of this article describing the Brass Plates were of better quality references, style, and completeness of coverage.

I do not wish to harm the excellent style and flow of this article. Is there a volunteer who can: 1. transcribe the relevant portions of this article to Brass Plates and 2. Replace current sections describing the Brass Plates with a good summary and links to the separate article? Stephen Charles Thompson (talk) 03:33, 18 June 2008 (UTC)


 * Hey! Do you happen to have an archived link or anything on the old Brass Plates article? It looks like it now just redirects to Laban.
 * Thanks!
 * BenBeckstromBYU (talk) 18:56, 26 October 2023 (UTC)

Class Rating
Stephen Charles Thompson (talk) 03:33, 18 June 2008 (UTC)
 * 1) Excellent coverage and depth
 * 2) Beautiful style and flow
 * 3) Excellent inclusion of related elements


 * Re-assessment


 * 1) Not comprehensive: the article is wholly sourced to primary sources; there should be reference to secondary sources which discuss the article subject.
 * 2) Reliability: About.com is not a reliable source. DrKiernan (talk) 18:11, 21 November 2008 (UTC)

External links modified
Hello fellow Wikipedians,

I have just modified 2 external links on Laban (Book of Mormon). Please take a moment to review my edit. If you have any questions, or need the bot to ignore the links, or the page altogether, please visit this simple FaQ for additional information. I made the following changes:
 * Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20071013071439/http://mormonbeliefs.com/book_of_the_law.htm to http://www.mormonbeliefs.com/book_of_the_law.htm
 * Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20071013071439/http://mormonbeliefs.com/book_of_the_law.htm to http://www.mormonbeliefs.com/book_of_the_law.htm

When you have finished reviewing my changes, you may follow the instructions on the template below to fix any issues with the URLs.

Cheers.— InternetArchiveBot  (Report bug) 06:25, 10 May 2017 (UTC)

Remodeling
I'm currently planning on creating separate pages for both the Sword of Laban and the Brass Plates. What my current thought is on their inclusion in the article as now extant is that I'm going to consolidate them into one section and add some academic commentary for now to use as a base for later editors expanding those pages (once I get them up and running). I'm also thinking about putting both the BoM movie and the Strangite canon into smaller subsections under an interpretation heading (which would also include some of the debate about the death of Laban).

Does anyone have any thoughts, resources, panegyrics, and/or denunciations they'd like to suggest? In particular, any academic sources on the sword of Laban in Mormon folklore would be amazing. BenBeckstromBYU (talk) 18:55, 26 October 2023 (UTC)


 * Well, the article as I found it was absolutely atrocious as it lacks context and does not situate this story in any wider understanding for its importance. I did some cleanup and editing but, suffice to say, splitting the article up seems extremely premature. Of course, I'm responding to a comment that was made nearly six months ago, so perhaps everyone has moved on. jps (talk) 11:34, 13 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Thank you for your feedback. I appreciate your patience while I'm working on improving my editing skills. Frankly, it was worse before I touched it (you could look at the diffs on especially narrative), but I've largely moved on to other topics and more research due to my schedule. If you would like, I can send you some sources on the topic if you'd like to improve the page or we can coordinate on other ways to improve. Then again, as I said, I haven't revisited Laban in depth in a while.
 * Also, yeah, the Sword of Laban and Plates are ideas I had that I moved on from. Thank you for your interest in my edits from last year, hope to be able to collaborate with you more later. 00:37, 14 March 2024 (UTC) BenBeckstromBYU (talk) 00:37, 14 March 2024 (UTC)
 * I tried to see what it looked like before you started working on it and I couldn't see a substantive difference, to be honest, but no matter. Please add the sources on this talkpage at your leisure! I would especially be interested in sources that identified the context for the beliefs about this story. How do Mormons use the story? (John Krakauer, for example, draws comparison between this story and a contemporary murder.) Why did Joseph Smith (or whoever of his compatriots may have authored the thing) write the story this way in the first place? Does the story connect with blood atonement (I think it does!)? Etc. jps (talk) 12:29, 14 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Are you talking about Ben's edits to this page creating no "substantive difference"? Ben significantly edited it, which you can see in this diff. Ben has done some initial research on people using ideas from the Book of Mormon in political contexts--you can see the sources he's found so far in his sandbox. Rachel Helps (BYU) (talk) 16:46, 14 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Yes, there is significant editing. I just don't think it is really an improvement? I'm not sure that this particular page benefits much from the Book of Mormon being used in political contexts, but if you have a source you think has a good word to say on the matter, happy to check it out. jps (talk) 17:29, 14 March 2024 (UTC)