Summary:

Joseph Smith translated the book of Mormon by supernatural means. As a faithful Mormon growing up in the church I believed that he used a device called the Urim and Thumim that was buried in the stone box with the plates. This turned out, not to be the case. The Urim and Thumim were apparently only used to translate the first (lost) 116 pages of the Book of Mormon. After Martin Harris lost this Book of Lehi the Angel became angry and confiscated the plates and the Urim and Thumim. The plates were eventually returned to Joseph, but the "translators" were not. From that point on when work on translating the plates continued Joseph used a peep stone he had in his possession from his ealier days as a scryer placed in the bottom of a hat. The plates were never looked at and were either in a box or under a cloth. Recently the church has released pictures of the seer stone and released an essay about the process of translation.

The first 116 pages of the Book of Mormon were translated using the Urim and Thumim fixed to a breastplate portrayed here.

Typical Artwork showing the translation process still found in churches and printed manuals today.

But this New Artwork portraying how the translation process more accurately occurred.

Why this matters:

• This is simply not what I was taught when I was growing up
• This is not what I taught others as a missionary 
• This is the same seer stone used for profit by Joseph to locate buried treasure by magical means
• Joseph used this stone in a hat method for both magical scrying and religious revelations
• This is the same seer stone that Joseph allegedly admitted he couldn't see anything in
• There is no indication that the stone works today. If it does than why aren't Seers of the church using it instead of hiding it in a vault all these years?
• This is the same seer stone that Joseph allegedly admitted he couldn't see anything in
• What was the point of the breastplate and Urim and Thumim if they were not used in the translation process
• What was the point of the Golden Plates if they were not used in the translation process 
• Joseph demonstrated later that through the stone he could translate documents buried in a cave on the other side of the world. Again, why did he need the gold plates?
• Church leaders blame the artists for not portraying the translation of the Book of Mormon accurately, while the church payed for and uses the artwork to teach about the Book of Mormon.
• Church leaders blame the members for not studying their history enough (when facts about the seer stone were scarce to say the least and could really only be found in anti-Mormon material)
• It turns out the South Park episode was right after all even though you told all your friends growing up that it was ridiculously inaccurate.