Documents feel like treasures to me. They give insight into the past and have to be mined to get everything you can out of them. Because of that, it’s really exciting that the Church has begun to release minutes from…
Category: Mormon Studies
Accuracy of the Journal of Discourses
One of my ongoing dreams is to be able to afford a full set of the Journal of Discourses as part of my collection of Latter-day Saint books (though given the price tag, it probably won’t happen any time soon).…
Saints 3: Thoughts from Scott Hales and Jed Woodworth
I hope by now it’s apparent that I am a fan of the Saints history series and that I’ve been really looking forward to Volume 3, which comes out on the 22nd. I will say, it’s fantastic, but you’ll get to read…
Let’s Talk about the Book of Abraham–a Review
Kerry Muhlstein’s Let’s Talk about the Book of Abraham Is the latest entry in a series that Deseret Book has been publishing to address controversial or touchy topics in the Church. Based on my experience with Brittany Chapman Nash’s Let’s…
Making Sense of Prophecies (6): Concluding Thoughts
The question “Did Samuel Lutz really write this” is ultimately not as useful as the question of how the prophecy of “Lutius Gratiano” came about, and what function it served for those who kept it in circulation.
John Sillito’s B. H. Roberts: A Life in the Public Arena (book review)
In traditional Christianity, there are significant figures known as the Early Church Fathers who are noted as influential Christian theologians and writers who established the intellectual and doctrinal foundations of Christianity as we know it today. While the Church of…
Making Sense of Prophecies (5): “Lutius Gratiano” in the 20th and 21st centuries
Making Sense of Prophecies (4): The Origin of “Lutius Gratiano”
With early efforts to locate the text in mind, we can now reconstruct the origin of the prophecy of “Lutius Gratiano.”
Making Sense of Prophecies (3): Reconsidering “Lutius Gratiano”
In the prophecy of “Lutius Gratiano,” we have the unusual opportunity to observe the formation and development of a prophecy in some detail.
Making Sense of Prophecies (2): How to Read a Prophecy
Earlier scholarship has often understood the function of prophetic texts as providing information about the future.
A Summary of the Arrington Mormon History Lecture: “A Marvelous Work: Reading Mormonism in West Africa”
What does Mormonism look like when reconstructed from texts in a non-American cultural context? The self-styled Mormon Churches that developed in West Africa during the 1960s and 1970s (prior to the lifting of the priesthood and temple ban on individuals…
Waiting For Saints 3
Three years ago this month, Saints, Volume 1: The Standard of Truth, 1815-1846 was published. Saints, Volume 2: No Unhallowed Hand, 1846-1893 followed about a year-and-a-half later in February 2020. If later volumes had followed the same cadence for releases,…
Terryl Givens on Eugene England
In general, the people who are in a position to be most influential in the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints have been official Church leaders. That’s not always the case, however, since there are a number of members…
Why Mormon Literature is Vital
Last night poet and author James Goldberg, current president of the Association for Mormon Letters (AML), gave a short but masterful Presidential address as part of the AML’s annual conference. His poetic style and urgent message is quite powerful, despite…
“It is given to some to speak with tongues”
I served my mission in the Midwestern United States, and we had a decent amount of contact with groups, such as the Pentecostals, who were enthusiastic about charismatic gifts of the Spirit. I remember on one occasion, that a missionary…
Use of the gold plates in Book of Mormon translation accounts
It’s become something of a communis opinio doctorum that Joseph Smith didn’t make use of the gold plates while translating the Book of Mormon.
Kent P. Jackson on the Joseph Smith Translation
Joseph Smith’s translation projects have been a hot topic this year. Among many others, earlier this fall we did two posts that discussed the possibility that Joseph Smith relied on the Adam Clarke commentaries for some of the changes he…
Concealment and divine prohibition in Book of Mormon translation accounts
A common motif in accounts of the translation of the Book of Mormon is how others beside Joseph Smith were forbidden, prevented, or to the contrary permitted to view the gold plates, the interpreters or the translation process.
How the Book of Mormon was translated: a proposal
I propose that there is a continuity of method connecting Joseph Smith’s translations of ancient texts, from the Book of Mormon to his encounter with the Kinderhook plates, and that this method was both expansive and linguistic.
Learning from Kinderhook
Don Bradley and Mark Ashurst-McGee have published the definitive account of Joseph Smith’s 1843 encounter with the Kinderhook plates.