On Thursday, Feb. 12, Thom Wayment, an assistant professor of ancient scripture at Brigham Young University, will speak about the various scriptural writings associated with the New Testament, including the King James Version, and how they relate to the Joseph Smith Translation.
The lecture, part of the library's House of Learning Lecture Series, will begin at 2 p.m. in the Lee Library auditorium.
All House of Learning Lectures are open to the campus and the public.
“There are currently more than 5,000 manuscripts of the New Testament which contain a total of 250,000 plus ‘variant readings,’” says Wayment. “Every translation is a decision on which variants to include and exclude.”
Last year Wayment began comparing all known textual variants to changes made by Joseph Smith for his inspired translation. He is now comparing the changes in the JST with variants in Greek, Latin and Coptic with the aid of Armenian, Georgian and Syriac scholars.
“We have done much of the initial work and have found a surprising degree of agreement with the JST,” says Wayment. Some of these correlations will be discussed in his lecture, along with how he has done the research.
Wayment joined the faculty at BYU in 2000, and received his Ph.D. in New Testament studies from Claremont College. He has also written a book about the last 24 hours of Jesus’ life titled "From the Last Supper Through the Resurrection: The Savior’s Final Hours" published by Deseret Book.
Writer: Michael Hooper
