Religious Education Commons^™

On Music Angels: God Only Knows, David M. Kirkham

BYU Studies Quarterly

The trek from my office at the Air Force Academy history department to the faculty parking lot was long enough--about a ten-minute walk--sufficient time for some substantive thinking. One winter evening in about 1992, as I made the walk, my Comparative Revolutions course weighed on my mind. As I pondered how I might introduce the next day's discussion on causes of revolutions, I climbed into my 1987 red Dodge Colt more out of habit than deliberation. At the turn of the ignition key, the radio's boom broke my reverie and jarred me back to the reality of my immediate surroundings. …

The Frontier Guardian: Exploring The Latter-Day Saint Experience At The Missouri, 1849–1851, Susan E. Black

BYU Studies Quarterly

As the largest Mormon primary source from 1849 to 1851, the Frontier Guardian is crucial to understanding the Latter-day Saint experience at the Missouri River. Until now, historians have extracted only small sections of the paper, such as marriage announcements, obituaries, and advertisements, because of the Guardian's size. Although it is only four volumes, the newspaper contains eighty-one issues, each spanning four pages in length and divided into six columns. This translates into roughly four thousand single-spaced pages on 8.5" x 11" paper. Fortunately, the recent publication The Best of the Frontier Guardian along with its searchable dvd-rom of …

Religion, Politics, And Sugar: The Mormon Church, The Federal Government, And The Utah-Idaho Sugar Company, 1907-1921, Matthew C. Godfrey, Barnard S. Silver

BYU Studies Quarterly

Matthew C. Godfrey. Religion, Politics, and Sugar: The Mormon Church, the Federal Government, and the Utah-Idaho Sugar Company, 1907–1921. Logan: Utah State University Press, 2007.

The Tree House, Philip A. Snyder, Douglas Thayer

BYU Studies Quarterly

Douglas Thayer. The Tree House: A Novel. Provo, Utah: Zarahemla Books, 2009.

Full Issue, Byu Studies

BYU Studies Quarterly

No abstract provided.

The Five Books Of Moses: A Translation With Commentary, Roger G. Baker, Robert Alter

BYU Studies Quarterly

There are Bibles aplenty in our world, hundreds if Amazon.com is any guide. In late 2009, Amazon listed over one thousand books on its Bible hit list that have not even been released yet. Over one thousand new books of the roughly 450,000 listed Bible hits portend heavy reading this year for those who try to keep up with things biblical. A beneficial search in this swim through the Amazon of books is for new Bible translations, which now seem plentiful, although there were very few in the years after King James. An almost three-century gap separates the King James …

One Good Man, Christian Vuissa, Director, Christian Vuissa, Jim Dalrymple

BYU Studies Quarterly

I had high hopes but reserved expectations while driving to see Christian Vuissa's latest film One Good Man. Though LDS cinema seems to have cooled and matured somewhat in recent years, it is nonetheless a movement that has generally been hit-and-miss at best. One Good Man comes as a welcome transition to deeper, more complex filmmaking. The film is far from perfect--it includes its fair share of cultural cliches and clunky sentimentality--but it also marks an insightful and timely turn toward a more intimate, nuanced exploration of LDS themes and culture.

One Good Man portrays a few days in …

Proclamation To The People: Nineteenth-Century Mormonism And The Pacific Basin Frontier, Kimberly W. Reid, Reid L. Neilson, Laurie F. Maffly-Kipp

BYU Studies Quarterly

Laurie F. Maffly-Kipp (Associate Professor of Religious Studies at the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, and author of Religion and Society in Frontier California) and Reid L. Neilson (Assistant Professor of Religious Studies at Brigham Young University and author and editor of several books, including Taking the Gospel to the Japanese) combine their expertise in this latest volume, Proclamation to the People: Nineteenth-Century Mormonism and the Pacific Basin Frontier. The Pacific Basin extends "from the west coast of the United States and South America, across the Pacific Islands from Hawaii to Tahiti, down to New Zealand and …

A Different God? Mitt Romney, The Religious Right, And The Mormon Question, Roger Terry, Craig L. Foster

BYU Studies Quarterly

As can be expected from a book published by Greg Kofford, Craig L. Foster's A Different God? is well researched and engaging. This book begins by examining the rise of the religious right and the power it exerts on the current political landscape. Foster presents a good deal of information that most Latter-day Saints will not be well acquainted with, such as the difference between evangelical and fundamentalist Christians, the emergence of the charismatic movement, the rise and fall of the Moral Majority, and the subsequent establishment of the Christian Coalition. This background is particularly pertinent to the majority of …

Understanding Same-Sex Attraction: Where To Turn And How To Help, John P. Livingstone, Shirley E. Cox, William C. Duncan, M. Gawain Wells, Kimberly W. Reid, Dennis V. Dahle, A. Dean Byrd, Doris R. Dant

BYU Studies Quarterly

Readers looking for a book that supports the idea of homosexuality being an innate part of one's identity will not be interested in Understanding Same-Sex Attraction: Where to Turn and How to Help. Instead, the authors of this book assert the unpopular opinion, backed by scientific research, that same-sex attraction can be lessened or eradicated in those who desire change and are willing to try. Readers who empathize with the Church's position on homosexuality will likely find hope and useful ideas in this five-hundred-page compilation, authored by professional psychologists and scholars. The book presents three angles on the topic: the …

What's The Harm? Does Legalizing Same-Sex Marriage Really Harm Individuals, Families Or Society?, Lynn D. Wardle, Paul A. Pratte

BYU Studies Quarterly

Written by nineteen interdisciplinary authors and edited by BYU professor of family law Lynn D. Wardle, What's the Harm? responds to several questions concerning same-sex marriage: does legalizing same-sex marriage harm traditional families? Does it discourage responsible sexual behavior and procreation? How does it affect the meaning of marriage? Does it impair basic freedoms to citizens and institutions?

In this potpourri of scholarly and legal papers, attorneys, educators, family counselors, and even linguists document through scientific studies and court cases the consequences already inflicted on men, women, and innocent children through practices such as abortion and no-fault divorce. Because …

It Starts With A Song: Celebrating Twenty-Five Years Of Songwriting At Byu, Produced By Ron Simpson, Greg Hansen, Ron Simpson

BYU Studies Quarterly

In the 1995 film Mr. Holland's Opus, a musician and composer tries to write one memorable piece of music to gain fame. He takes a job as a high school music teacher to pay the bills and over time discovers unexpected and even greater fulfillment during his thirty-year teaching career.

Such a story has parallels to that of Brigham Young University's Ron Simpson, producer of this CD, general manager of Tantara Records, coordinator of the Media Music Division of BYU's School of Music, and music director of the Young Ambassadors. Simpson left a career as a studio owner, producer, …

An Approach To The Book Of Abraham, Hugh Nibley

Maxwell Institute Publications

Originally published in 1957, An Approach to the Book of Mormon is Dr. Hugh Nibley’s classic work on the Book of Mormon. A gifted scholar with expertise in ancient languages, literature, and history, Nibley shows numerous details in the Book of Mormon narrative to be in accord with cultural traits of the Middle East.

He examines Lehi as a representative man of his time, the Jews and the caravan trade, Lehi’s Arab and Egyptian connections, politics in Jerusalem, the pioneer tradition, the Dead Sea Scrolls, the Apocrypha, Lehi’s dreams, proper names, Old World ritual in the New World, the Jaredite …

The Sermon At The Temple And The Sermon On The Mount: A Latter-Day Saint Approach, John W. Welch

Maxwell Institute Publications

The Sermon on the Mount has had greater influence on the history and character of Christianity than any other text in the Bible. Yet as biblical scholar Hans Dieter Betz has recently lamented, “New Testament scholarship up to the present has offered no satisfactory explanation of this vitally important text.”

The Sermon at the Temple and the Sermon on the Mount, by John W. Welch, offers, for the first time, a thorough Latter-day Saint interpretation of Jesus’ famous sermon. The author relies especially on crucial information and details that only the Book of Mormon can supply.

In New Testament Palestine, …

A Textual History Of The Book Of Abraham: Manuscripts And Editions, Brian M. Hauglid

Maxwell Institute Publications

In July 1835 at Kirtland Ohio, a traveling antiquities dealer brought to Joseph Smith, the Mormon Prophet, four Egyptian mummies and several rolls of papyri. Upon inspection Smith determined that one of the rolls contained a lost record of the patriarch Abraham. After purchasing these artifacts for $2400 Smith generated through translation five chapters that appeared during March 1842 in Nauvoo, Illinois in the Times and Seasons, a Mormon periodical, under the title “The Book of Abraham”. This book has since become a canonized text of scripture for members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.

A Textual …

The Misunderstood First Amendment And Our Lives Online, Cheryl B. Preston

BYU Studies Quarterly

Certainly, we have always been warned about the harms of pornography. Jesus said, "Ye have heard that it was said by them of old time, Thou shalt not commit adultery: But I say unto you, That whosoever looketh on a woman to lust after her hath committed adultery with her already in his heart" (Matt. 5:27–28). But the prophets have become increasingly insistent in their warnings during the last several decades. This spike in prophetic warning corresponds to the development of technology.