We have a Childrens Bible that my children love. It has 25 Bible stories: David and Goliath, Daniel in the Lion’s den, Abraham, Joseph, etc. I asked my children about some Book of Mormon stories such as Ammon and the sheep, Nephi’s boat, and realized that my children weren’t familiar with these stories. So, I decided to write my own version of the most important Book of Mormon stories that I thought my kids could understand. I used the Childrens Bible as my guide, and tried to tell the stories in about 100 words or so, and thought it would be fun for my kids to draw pictures of the stories.
Newell Bringhurst Discusses the Mountain Meadows Massacre
Mormon historian Newell Bringhurst recently published a new essay discussing the infamous Mountain Meadows Massacre. For those of you unfamiliar with him, he has written extensively on topics of Mormon history. Some of his books are found here, and here is a short bio on him.
Here’s a brief background concerning the disaster. The Fancher and Baker families were moving from Arkansas to California. As they traveled through Utah, nearly all the men, women, and children were killed by Mormons–around 120 in all died. Initially, the Mormons tried to blame it on the Indians, but as the evidence has come out, it appears the Mormons are primarily (some say entirely) responsible for the deaths. It is the darkest chapter in Mormon history. In his latest essay, Bringhurst discusses the most prominent books (both positive and negative) dealing with the Mountain Meadows Massacre: Continue Reading »
Foundations of Book of Mormon Archaeology
I’ve been enjoying Terryl Givens book, By the Hand of Mormon. He has a positive view of Mormon scholarship, and goes into detail of both literary and archaeological scholarship. Wikipedia has some interesting information on Givens:
His second book, By the Hand of Mormon, is seen as his most important contribution to Mormon studies to date because it is the first academic survey of the significance of the Book of Mormon to believer and skeptic alike to be published by a major academic press (Oxford University Press). In it, Givens argues that the Book of Mormon has been important primarily for its existence and extra-textual historical claims rather than for its contents. Givens also makes a case for what he calls “dialogic revelation” as a novel contribution of the Book of Mormon. In current projects, he seems to be moving in the direction of broader engagement with religious themes across time and the western religious and philosophical traditions.
Critical response
Please Vote for the Niblets
Mormon Matters has put together “the best of the bloggernacle” awards, which have been dubbed “the Niblets”. I guess it is a sort of fans’ choice awards. So, be sure to go there and vote! If you don’t vote for me (I have 2 nominations there), be sure to vote for the Faithful Dissident, Irrestible Disgrace, Clean Cut and The Fire Still Burning! And if you have your own blog, be sure to let others know about the vote! Oh, and please let me know who I forgot to stump for.
The Shakers of D&C 49
After Christmas, we decided to finally upgrade our television, and got a new 55 inch HD LCD. It’s pretty nice. As part of the package, we are able to download Netflix directly to the television. The first Netflix movie I watched on my new television was Ken Burns’ America: The Shakers (1985). I picked it because I remembered that there was a mission to the Shakers in D&C 49.
LDS Film Festival 2010
The LDS Film Festival begins Jan 20. I admit to being an aspiring film maker. I have great designs to one day do a documentary on some church related topic. I’ve been to the festival for the past 3 years, and I hope to be able to go this weekend. The schedule can be found here. Here’s some movies I would like to see, if I had unlimited time:
Home Teaching the Mentally Ill-What should you do?
For those unfamiliar with a home teacher, the idea is to have everyone visited in the ward, whether they come to church or not. The home teacher often offers a short spiritual thought. I believe home teaching is based on D&C 20:47, “And visit the house of each member, and exhort them to apray bvocally and in secret and attend to all cfamily duties.”
It’s a nice idea in theory, but in practice, home teaching is quite often something that doesn’t get done very often. I suspect the average ward completion percentage for home teaching is about 50%. Usually, people just get too busy to do home teaching each month, but not always. Home teachers are not always welcome. In my previous ward, I was assigned to a part-member family (the husband was an inactive member, the wife was a non-member.) When I got to the door with my partner, we introduced ourselves as the home teachers. The wife told us at the door that they didn’t go to church, didn’t want to go, and didn’t want us to come back. I handed her a plate of cookies my wife had prepared, and wished her well. I reported back to my Elder’s quorum president the exchange, and he told me they would try to have a neighbor become their home teacher on an informal basis. I had an even more unusual experience today.
The Brigham Young Papers: (There is a soft side to him)
There has been much press about volumes 1 and 2 of The Joseph Smith Papers Project. My wife even spoiled me with a copy of volume 2 this past Christmas. It contains the actual hand-written revelations of Joseph, along with a typed copy to help the reader understand some of the hard to read handwriting.
Well, Signature Books has just released something similar for Brigham Young. This article from the Salt Lake Tribune talks about the release of The Complete Discourses of Brigham Young , a five-volume work. For a mere $500, you can own every version of every speech known to exist. Richard Van Wagoner, author of Sidney Rigdon: A Portrait in Religious Excess (I did a 6 part review starting here) has compiled these speeches over the last 15 years. The Tribune article has some interesting quotes from Van Wagoner.
Why Mormons Hated Republicans in the Late 1800’s
I just finished the book by Sarah Baringer Gordon, The Mormon Question. It was a very different book from the previous book I read, More Wives than One, by Kathryn Daynes. Gordon has degrees in both Law and Religion. She looked at Constitutional theory and the arguments before the Supreme Court and Congress as the government made many attempts to shut down polygamy.
Did Joseph Start a Religion, or Simply a Denomination?
The book for my book club is by Sarah Baringer Gordon, The Mormon Question. It’s been a really hard book to find at the library (nearly impossible), so I got a late start on it. It takes a very different approach to the polygamy question. Ms Gordon has a law degree, and so she talks about the legal arguments concerning the separation of church and state. I’ve learned a lot about the evolution of legal thought and the Constitution. There hasn’t been a strict separation, especially during the 1800’s. The Mormons helped define that line.
Mormon Heretic 