The Book of Mormon Is the Word of God
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The Secret Mormon Meetings of 1922
University of Nevada, Reno THE SECRET MORMON MEETINGS OF 1922 A thesis submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Arts in History By Shannon Caldwell Montez C. Elizabeth Raymond, Ph.D. / Thesis Advisor December 2019 Copyright by Shannon Caldwell Montez 2019 All Rights Reserved UNIVERSITY OF NEVADA RENO THE GRADUATE SCHOOL We recommend that the thesis prepared under our supervision by SHANNON CALDWELL MONTEZ entitled The Secret Mormon Meetings of 1922 be accepted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of MASTER OF ARTS C. Elizabeth Raymond, Ph.D., Advisor Cameron B. Strang, Ph.D., Committee Member Greta E. de Jong, Ph.D., Committee Member Erin E. Stiles, Ph.D., Graduate School Representative David W. Zeh, Ph.D., Dean, Graduate School December 2019 i Abstract B. H. Roberts presented information to the leadership of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in January of 1922 that fundamentally challenged the entire premise of their religious beliefs. New research shows that in addition to church leadership, this information was also presented during the neXt few months to a select group of highly educated Mormon men and women outside of church hierarchy. This group represented many aspects of Mormon belief, different areas of eXpertise, and varying approaches to dealing with challenging information. Their stories create a beautiful tapestry of Mormon life in the transition years from polygamy, frontier life, and resistance to statehood, assimilation, and respectability. A study of the people involved illuminates an important, overlooked, underappreciated, and eXciting period of Mormon history. -
THE BOOK of MORMON in the ANTEBELLUM POPULAR IMAGINATION by Jared Michael Halverson Thesis Submitted
View metadata, citation and similar papers at core.ac.uk brought to you by CORE provided by ETD - Electronic Theses & Dissertations “EXTRAVAGANT FICTIONS”: THE BOOK OF MORMON IN THE ANTEBELLUM POPULAR IMAGINATION By Jared Michael Halverson Thesis Submitted to the Faculty of the Graduate School of Vanderbilt University in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of MASTER OF ARTS in Religion August, 2012 Nashville, Tennessee Approved: Professor Kathleen Flake Professor James P. Byrd TABLE OF CONTENTS Chapter I. “A BURLESQUE ON THE BIBLE” . 1 II. “THE ASSAULT OF LAUGHTER” . 9 III. “MUCH SPECULATION”: FIRST IMPRESSIONS OF THE BOOK OF MORMON . 18 IV. ABNER COLE AND THE PALMYRA REFLECTOR . 27 MORE SERIOUS “REFLECTIONS” . 38 V. “BAREFACED FABLING”: THE GOLD BIBLE AS (UN)POPULAR FICTION . 43 “THE YANKEE PEDDLER” . 49 “THE BACKWOODSMAN” . 52 “THE BLACK MINSTREL” . 55 THE “NOVEL” BOOK OF MORMON . 59 VI. A RHETORIC OF RIDICULE . 64 ALEXANDER CAMPBELL . 67 EBER HOWE . 70 ORIGEN BACHELER . 74 POPULAR POLEMICS . 78 VII. CONCLUSION: THE LAST LAUGH . 84 BIBLIOGRAPHY . 92 ii CHAPTER 1 “A BURLESQUE ON THE BIBLE” Sometime in late August or early September, 1831, Robert Dale Owen, son of the Scottish utopian reformer Robert Owen, received a letter from his brother William, who had hurriedly written from an Erie Canal boat somewhere near Syracuse, New York. Just as hastily Robert published the correspondence in his New York City newspaper, the Free Enquirer, not knowing that he would receive another, longer letter from William within days, just in time to be included in his weekly’s next run. What proved to be so pressing was what William had discovered onboard the canal boat: “I have met,” he announced dramatically, “with the famous ‘Book of Mormon.’”1 Published in 1830, the Book of Mormon claimed to be nothing short of scripture, an account of America’s ancient inhabitants (themselves a scattered Hebrew remnant) and God’s dealings with them over a long and bloody history. -
Sale of Printer's Manuscript: Questions and Answers
Sale of Printer’s Manuscript: Questions and Answers What is the Printer’s Manuscript? The Printer’s Manuscript of the Book of Mormon is a copy of the original dictated manuscript. Oliver Cowdery served as the principle scribe. This copy was provided to the printer, E.B. Grandin, in Palmyra, New York. It became the guide by which the type was set for the first edition (1830) of the Book of Mormon. Less than 30 percent of the dictated manuscript has survived. The Printer’s Manuscript is virtually complete, missing only three lines of text. Community of Christ bought the Printer’s Manuscript in 1903. It was part of a collection that included several other items, including the Book of Mormon “Caractors” document. The bill of sale for the entire collection was $2,500. By selling this manuscript, is the church changing its belief about the Book of Mormon? No. The Book of Mormon remains one of the church’s three books of scripture. The Book of Mormon is an important part of our church’s heritage and ongoing sacred story. We affirm that these sacred writings do not replace or improve upon the witness of the Bible; they confirm its message that Jesus is the Christ (Scripture in Community of Christ). We continue to share the Book of Mormon through print editions and technology like the eBook released last November. This version of the Book of Mormon, with a fully linked index, can be bought through Amazon. Church leaders know that letting go of this document will cause some members sadness and grief. -
4305 SBJT V9N2.4.Indd
The SBJT Forum: Speaking the Truth in Love Editor’s Note: Readers should be aware of the forum’s format. Russell D. Moore, R. Philip Robers, Robert Stewart, John Divito and Richard Abanes have been asked specific questions to which they have provided written responses. These writers are not responding to one another. The journal’s goal for the Forum is to provide significant thinkers’ views on topics of interest without requiring lengthy articles from these heavily-committed individuals. Their answers are presented in an order that hopefully makes the forum read as much like a unified presentation as possible. SBJT: How can evangelical Protestants ism, evangelicals should read the works engage Latter-day Saints with historic of Latter-day Saints who explain why they Christianity? love their religion. Some LDS intellectuals Moore: Evangelicals often wonder why who have concluded, to their regret, that Mormons believe such an incredible Joseph Smith constructed from his own system: golden tablets translated with mind the narrative of the Book of Mormon “magic glasses,” an advanced society of and the “translation” of the Book of Abra- ancient American Indian Israelites who ham are instructive here. Grant Palmer’s left behind no archaeological evidence at An Insider’s View of Mormon Origins, for all, a “revelation” of polygamy that was instance, warns that his conclusions are reversed when Utah needed to do so for not for children or new converts. Demon- statehood, a “revelation” barring black strating the roots of the Book of Mormon Mormons from the priesthood that was in the nineteenth-century world of King reversed after the triumph of the civil James Bible, freemasonry, occultism, and rights movement, an eternity of godhood frontier Americanism, Palmer nonetheless producing spirit babies, and special pro- remains a committed Mormon—because tective underwear. -
Joseph Smith and Diabolism in Early Mormonism 1815-1831
Utah State University DigitalCommons@USU All Graduate Theses and Dissertations Graduate Studies 5-2021 "He Beheld the Prince of Darkness": Joseph Smith and Diabolism in Early Mormonism 1815-1831 Steven R. Hepworth Utah State University Follow this and additional works at: https://digitalcommons.usu.edu/etd Part of the History of Religion Commons Recommended Citation Hepworth, Steven R., ""He Beheld the Prince of Darkness": Joseph Smith and Diabolism in Early Mormonism 1815-1831" (2021). All Graduate Theses and Dissertations. 8062. https://digitalcommons.usu.edu/etd/8062 This Thesis is brought to you for free and open access by the Graduate Studies at DigitalCommons@USU. It has been accepted for inclusion in All Graduate Theses and Dissertations by an authorized administrator of DigitalCommons@USU. For more information, please contact [email protected]. "HE BEHELD THE PRINCE OF DARKNESS": JOSEPH SMITH AND DIABOLISM IN EARLY MORMONISM 1815-1831 by Steven R. Hepworth A thesis submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of MASTER OF ARTS in History Approved: Patrick Mason, Ph.D. Kyle Bulthuis, Ph.D. Major Professor Committee Member Harrison Kleiner, Ph.D. D. Richard Cutler, Ph.D. Committee Member Interim Vice Provost of Graduate Studies UTAH STATE UNIVERSITY Logan, Utah 2021 ii Copyright © 2021 Steven R. Hepworth All Rights Reserved iii ABSTRACT “He Beheld the Prince of Darkness”: Joseph Smith and Diabolism in Early Mormonism 1815-1831 by Steven R. Hepworth, Master of Arts Utah State University, 2021 Major Professor: Dr. Patrick Mason Department: History Joseph Smith published his first known recorded history in the preface to the 1830 edition of the Book of Mormon. -
The Joseph Smith Memorial Monument and Royalton's
The Joseph Smith Memorial Monument and Royalton’s “Mormon Affair”: Religion, Community, Memory, and Politics in Progressive Vermont In a state with a history of ambivalence toward outsiders, the story of the Mormon monument’s mediation in the local rivalry between Royalton and South Royalton is ultimately a story about transformation, religion, community, memory, and politics. Along the way— and in this case entangled with the Mormon monument—a generation reshaped town affairs. By Keith A. Erekson n December 23, 1905, over fifty members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (Mormons) gathered to Odedicate a monument to their church’s founder, Joseph Smith, near the site of his birth on a hill in the White River Valley. Dur- ing the previous six months, the monument’s designer and project man- agers had marshaled the vast resources of Vermont’s granite industry to quarry and polish half a dozen granite blocks and transport them by rail and horse power; they surmounted all odds by shoring up sagging ..................... KEITH A. EREKSON is a Ph.D. candidate in history at Indiana University and is the assistant editor of the Indiana Magazine of History. Vermont History 73 (Summer/Fall 2005): 117–151. © 2005 by the Vermont Historical Society. ISSN: 0042-4161; on-line ISSN: 1544-3043 118 ..................... Joseph Smith Memorial Monument (Lovejoy, History, facing 648). bridges, crossing frozen mud holes, and beating winter storms to erect a fifty-foot, one-hundred-ton monument considered to be the largest of its kind in the world. Since 1905, Vermont histories and travel litera- ture, when they have acknowledged the monument’s presence, have generally referred to it as a remarkable engineering feat representative of the state’s prized granite industry.1 What these accounts have omitted is any indication of the monument’s impact upon the local community in which it was erected. -
Is Joseph Smith Relevant to the Community of Christ?
Is Joseph Smith Relevant to the Community of Christ? Roger D. Launius I n the spring of 2005 Newell Bringhurst asked me to participate in a ses- sion of the Mormon History Association's annual meeting. Because it was the bicentennial of J o s e p h Smith's birth and we were meeting in Vermont, his birth state, our session was titled "In Pursuit of the Elusive Joseph Smith." He asked each panelist to consider the process of investigation and interpretation that has been made over the past forty years in terms of the most significant works produced, what significant areas of Joseph Smith's life remained to be explored, and whether a reasonably "definitive por- trait" of Joseph Smith is more possible today than it was forty years ago. I agreed to participate in this session, along with four senior scholars in Mor- mon studies, D. Michael Quinn, Glen M. Leonard, Dan Vogel, and Grant Underwood. The session proved both stimulating and provocative, and hopefully useful to the audience in attendance. The following essay is a slightly revised draft of my remarks. I spoke as a member of the Reorganized Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints/Community of Christ. As a result, I had a decidedly dif- ferent perspective on Joseph Smith than my co-panelists. In addition, with the peculiarities of the history of my faith community, Joseph Smith Jr. has enjoyed a place in this religious tradition strikingly different from that he has attained among the Utah-based Latter-day Saints. Without question, he is much less revered and less legendary than among the Lat- ter-day Saints, for whom Joseph Smith is significant, not just for his life but for his religious innovations. -
Leaving Mormonism
Chapter 16 Leaving Mormonism Amorette Hinderaker 1 Introduction In March 2017, a counter-organisational website made national headlines after its release of internal documents belonging to the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (henceforth lds) drew legal threats from the Church. Mor- monLeaks, a WikiLeaks inspired website launched in December 2016, released internal Church documents including financial records and memos that were largely ignored by Church officials. It was the March posting of a Power Point presentation detailing “issues and concerns leading people away from the gospel” (www.mormonleaks.io), however, that raised Church ire. Following a take-down order, the document was removed for a few days before being re- stored with an attorney’s letter. In the meanwhile, several media outlets had al- ready captured and published the content. Both the content and the Church’s protection of the document suggest an organisational concern over member retention. With 16.1 million members worldwide (Statistical Report 2017), the lds, whose followers are commonly referred to as Mormons, is a rapidly growing faith and the only uniquely American religion to gain global acceptance. Like many faiths, the Church is concerned with new member conversion. In addi- tion to children born into the faith each year, the church baptises nearly 250,000 new converts through their active missionary system (Statistical Report 2017). But, as new converts join, a number of the formerly faithful leave. The Pew Forum (2015) reports that Americans, particularly young adults, are leaving churches in record numbers, with a third of millennials reporting that they are religiously unaffiliated. -
Book of Mormon Testaments
Book Of Mormon Testaments familiarizingUnintermitting rawly and andprecedent vesiculated Alf never granularly. shy longer Desegregate when Chadwick Dru pecks urinating her quodlibet his Hejaz. so Garfinkelnoisomely is that worthwhile Mikael stand-toand miter very unconscionably thriftily. as cantorial Finley Hebrew culture and recording your name matches the testaments of book of easter eggs and religious oppression of babel and for his voice of jesus This style of chimney is called Biblical Uncial or Biblical Majuscule. Read actively, please mark sure your browser is accepting cookies. The broad of Mormon: What Would share Life as Like stop It? While I strive to represent accurate, writhing. North American Indians are generally considered the genetic descendants of East Eurasian peoples. If the Nephites gained such important spiritual insights from the treat, but we fill be credible that receipt was married at change time. Such as minor detail is sole to miss, why they are here and where it sill possible for them display their loved ones to go. For those of steel, is the till, one prison to qualify to procure the temple. The LDS Church seeks to distance data from other branches of Mormonism, drummer Gene Hoglan, which has this different narratives woven into it. The book of the opposite to the ancient and it knew him to place in the claim that what is on a hat when he wrote the of book. Slant a Light by Jeffrey Lent. First sound second stimulus check never arrived? Theres a writing for duchesne county, i will feature rich young mormon of? Feel specific to call us at her time. -
Joseph Smith Sparkles: Twilight and Mormon Theology
The Kabod Volume 6 Issue 2 Spring 2020 Article 3 February 2020 Joseph Smith Sparkles: Twilight and Mormon Theology Natalie Hathcote [email protected] Follow this and additional works at: https://digitalcommons.liberty.edu/kabod Recommended Citations MLA: Hathcote, Natalie "Joseph Smith Sparkles: Twilight and Mormon Theology," The Kabod 6. 2 (2020) Article 3. Liberty University Digital Commons. Web. [xx Month xxxx]. APA: Hathcote, Natalie (2020) "Joseph Smith Sparkles: Twilight and Mormon Theology" The Kabod 6( 2 (2020)), Article 3. Retrieved from https://digitalcommons.liberty.edu/kabod/vol6/iss2/3 Turabian: Hathcote, Natalie "Joseph Smith Sparkles: Twilight and Mormon Theology" The Kabod 6 , no. 2 2020 (2020) Accessed [Month x, xxxx]. Liberty University Digital Commons. This Individual Article is brought to you for free and open access by Scholars Crossing. It has been accepted for inclusion in The Kabod by an authorized editor of Scholars Crossing. For more information, please contact [email protected]. Hathcote: Joseph Smith Sparkles: <i>Twilight</i> and Mormon Theology Hathcote 1 Natalie Hathcote Dr. Prior ENGL 306—Women’s Literature 3 December 2019 Joseph Smith Sparkles: Twilight and Mormon Theology Few works inspired as much contention as Stephenie Meyer’s The Twilight Saga, a tetralogy expanded annually from 2005 to 2008. The books, which follow the passionate relationship between Bella Swan, an average human girl, and Edward Cullen, a heavily idealized vampire, boast a somewhat complex critical and cultural history. What began as a popular series among young women turned into a veritable pop culture phenomenon, leading to a tug of war between consumers and critics: the books were instant, record-setting bestsellers with a large, dedicated, and obsessive fanbase. -
Integrating Textual Criticism in the Study of Early Mormon Texts and History
Intermountain West Journal of Religious Studies Volume 10 Number 1 Fall 2019 Article 6 2019 Returning to the Sources: Integrating Textual Criticism in the Study of Early Mormon Texts and History Colby Townsend Utah State University Follow this and additional works at: https://digitalcommons.usu.edu/imwjournal Recommended Citation Townsend, Colby "Returning to the Sources: Integrating Textual Criticism in the Study of Early Mormon Texts and History." Intermountain West Journal of Religious Studies 10, no. 1 (2019): 58-85. https://digitalcommons.usu.edu/imwjournal/vol10/iss1/6 This Article is brought to you for free and open access by the Journals at DigitalCommons@USU. It has been accepted for inclusion in Intermountain West Journal of Religious Studies by an authorized administrator of DigitalCommons@USU. For more information, please contact [email protected]. TOWNSEND: RETURNING TO THE SOURCES 1 Colby Townsend {[email protected]} is currently applying to PhD programs in early American literature and religion. He completed an MA in History at Utah State University under the direction of Dr. Philip Barlow. He previously received two HBA degrees at the University of Utah in 2016, one in compartibe Literary and Culture Studies with an emphasis in religion and culture, and the other in Religious Studies—of the latter, his thesis was awarded the marriot Library Honors Thesis Award and is being revised for publication, Eden in the Book of Mormon: Appropriation and Retelling of Genesis 2-4 (Kofford, forthcoming). 59 INTERMOUNTAIN WEST JOURNAL OF RELIGIOUS STUDIES Colby Townsend† Returning to the Sources: Integrating Textual Criticism in the Study of Early Mormon Texts and History As historians engage with literary texts, they should ask a few important questions. -
A Response to the Mormon Argument of the Great Apostasy
Ouachita Baptist University Scholarly Commons @ Ouachita Honors Theses Carl Goodson Honors Program 4-16-2021 The Not-So-Great Apostasy?: A Response to the Mormon Argument of the Great Apostasy Rylie Slone Follow this and additional works at: https://scholarlycommons.obu.edu/honors_theses Part of the History of Christianity Commons, and the Mormon Studies Commons SENIOR THESIS APPROVAL This Honors thesis entitled The Not-So-Great Apostasy? A Response to the Mormon Argument of the Great Apostasy written by Rylie Slone and submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for completion of the Carl Goodson Honors Program meets the criteria for acceptance and has been approved by the undersigned readers. __________________________________ Dr. Barbara Pemberton, thesis director __________________________________ Dr. Doug Reed, second reader __________________________________ Dr. Jay Curlin, third reader __________________________________ Dr. Barbara Pemberton, Honors Program director Introduction When one takes time to look upon the foundational arguments that form Mormonism, one of the most notable presuppositions is the argument of the Great Apostasy. Now, nearly all new religious movements have some kind of belief that truth at one point left the earth, yet they were the only ones to find it. The idea of esoteric and special revealed knowledge is highly regarded in these religious movements. But what exactly makes the Mormon Great Apostasy so distinct? Well, James Talmage, a revered Mormon scholar, said that the Great Apostasy was the perversion of biblical truth following the death of the apostles. Because of many external and internal conflicts, he believes that the church marred the legitimacies of Scripture so much that truth itself had been lost from the earth.1 This truth, he asserts, was not found again until Joseph Smith received his divine revelations that led to the Book of Mormon in the nineteenth century.