Joseph Smith Translation of the Bible - John 1.1

First off, "The Greek supports that--in fact if you read the Greek it would be all mixed up and the line wouldn't even come out that way." That's proof #1 that he hasn't taken any Greek, since while Greek doesn't have the word-order requirements that English does, this is very specifically a verse where the words are in almost the exact same order in both languages.

Second, one of my professors actually brought up this translation of this verse as a definition of the variety of appropriate translations, because Joseph Smith's "translation" is actually mostly grammatically correct. But more than that, it was never written as a literal translation--it's an expository paraphrasing, an explanatory translation. So no one's implying you should "discount the beautiful passages of John"--Mormons are just as likely to study Greek, Latin, and Hebrew as any other religion is; and a lot more likely to read the Bible than most religions; but Joseph Smith's translation (which was never given publicly, but basically written in the margins of his Bible) is presumably to be used as a poetical and explanatory concordance.

Okay, I'll stop now. Just know that this guy isn't academically qualified to make this statement--he just doesn't like Mormons.