A new video on the Book of Mormon titled “New Day for the Book of Mormon” premiered after General Conference on BYUtv. It features interviews with Elder Jeffrey R. Holland, Terryl Givens, Stephen C. Webb, Paul Gutjahr, John W. Welch, and others. I wanted to transcribe a few of my favorite lines from the film, … Read more
Earl Wunderli recently published a book arguing that the Book of Mormon is 19th century fiction. It was, unsurprisingly, published by Signature Books. The reviews of Wunderli’s work are in, and so far the critical responses to the book have been . . . not that great. Matthew Roper, Paul Fields, and Larry Bassist, “‘If … Read more
The temple of the Community of Christ in Independence, Missouri. I took this picture when I visited this site last year. This afternoon I ran into Professor Alex Baugh on BYU campus, who very kindly handed me a copy of the latest issue of the Mormon Historical Studies journal. As I was thumbing through the … Read more
I know I need to stop doing this . . . You will recall that Richard Dawkins believes the Book of Mormon is a fraud because of its archaic English. Specifically, Mr. Dawkins believes, “[The Book of Mormon is] a 19th century book written in 16th century English. That’s not the way people talked in … Read more
Professor Alexander L. Baugh is a professor of Church History at Brigham Young University. He is the author of numerous articles on early Church history and wrote the magnificent dissertation A Call to Arms: The 1838 Mormon Defense of Northern Missouri, one of the definitive works on the 1838 Mormon War. You can read the … Read more
1. From J. N. Washburn (sent to me by my friend Neal Rappleye): I have no fears for the future of the Book of Mormon. While I may agree with those who say, “If it is man-made, the sooner we find it out the better,” I am convinced that it will stand up under all … Read more
My roommate made me this picture. Click to enlarge For info on the humor behind this joke, see the following links here, here, and here.
A depiction of the prophet Jeremiah by Michelangelo on the Sistine Chapel ceiling. The prophet Jeremiah did not have an easy job. Besides being called to preach an unpopular message to a stubborn and wicked people, he was also confronted by plots to end his life, stonewalling and obfuscating Judahite magistrates, and false prophets who … Read more
The Bar’an temple in Yemen. Warren Aston has a piece in Meridian Magazine on the NHM altar inscriptions that’s worth reading. Aston, having presented his findings on the Nihm tribe of Yemen at such places as Cambridge University, is one of the leading experts in the study of this topic. Besides discussing the history of … Read more
A portrait of Esarhaddon on a stele. You can never tell what neat little things you’ll find lying around in ancient archives. For example, the archives of the Assyrian king Esarhaddon (who reigned from 681–669 BC) contains a text (Simo Parpola calls it a “Meal of Covenant”) that reads as follows. The word of Ištar of … Read more
I’ve heard, on many occasions, liberal or progressive Mormons* repeat the scriptural mantra “all are alike unto God” (2 Nephi 26:33) in their activism for feminist or LGBT issues. Take this image below, for example, or this website promoting more inclusive gender roles in the Church. Notice the sign second from the right. Without passing … Read more
You can see where this is going . . . David Bokovoy will soon be releasing the first volume of his three-volume series Authoring the Old Testament. In this series, Bokovoy will, among other things, present and argue for the Documentary Hypothesis (DH) to an LDS audience. He will not only discuss what the DH … Read more
Joseph Smith Preaching to the Indians (1890) by William Armitage. Some of the responses to the Church’s recent essay on DNA and the Book of Mormon have been rather perplexing. (The responses of certain prominent critics of the Church, who shall, for their sakes, remain nameless, were downright embarrassing.) One of the responses I’ve heard … Read more