Religion Commons^™

Searching For A Self-Reflexive Theology: Ways Forward For Systematic Theology In Relation To (Non) Religious Thought In Contemporary Western Culture, Colby Dickinson

Theology: Faculty Publications and Other Works

This article aims to draw attention, first, to the need to explore the inner plurality of theological discourse, as such plural discourses serve to promote a certain dynamism and fullness within theology as a field, especially in relation to religious studies today. Second, such a potential fullness is reflected in the modern struggle to characterize the relationship between faith and reason. Comprehending the misunderstandings, often construed as an impasse between faith and reason, could foster new relations between scientific methods and theological imaginations. Third, understanding these tensions from a systematic theological perspective also entails a more precise analysis of the …

Business And Merchants Will Not Enter The Places Of My Father: Early Christianity And Market Mentality, Edmondo Lupieri

Theology: Faculty Publications and Other Works

At the time of the redaction of the New Testament (NT), the relatively newly constituted Roman Empire seems to have brought some sort of political uniformity to the whole Mediterranean world. This phenomenon must have had some kind of financial repercussions due to a more centralized administration and a relatively larger diffusion of a standardized monetary system. Can we understand if this had any impact on the preaching of (the historical) Jesus? Did his early followers have the memory of any teaching of his regarding money, its possession or its use? And, in the times and areas they were living …

Soziale Roboter Für Ältere Menschen? Ethische Überlegungen Zur Sozialen Interaktion Mit Robotern Im Gesundheitswesen, Hille Haker

Theology: Faculty Publications and Other Works

No abstract provided.

The Profanation Of Revelation: On Language And Immanence In The Work Of Giorgio Agamben, Colby Dickinson

Theology: Faculty Publications and Other Works

This essay seeks to articulate the many implications which Giorgio Agamben’s work holds for theology. It aims therefore to examine his (re)conceptualizations of language, in light of particular historical glosses on the ‘name of God’ and the nature of the ‘mystical’, as well as to highlight the political task of profanation, one of his most central concepts, in relation to the logos said to embody humanity’s ‘religious’ quest to find its Voice. As such, we see how he challenges those standard (ontotheological) notions of transcendence which have been consistently aligned with various historical forms of sovereignty. In addition, I intend …

Are The Only True Atheists Actually Theologians?, Colby Dickinson

Theology: Faculty Publications and Other Works

Contemporary continental European philosophy circulates around particular apocalyptic themes, offering new insights and suggestive proposals for theology to think through the implications of this often most difficult of religious subjects. As such philosophies manoeuvre to define apocalyptic through its return to questions of antinomian thought, of the 'interruption' of normative religious imagery, and of the negation of our most cherished theological representations (including our representations of God and the Law), we constantly find these philosophers engaged with the most basic foundations of Western religious history. From its inception, apocalyptic has been a genre of literature, and more generally of religious …

The Quakerization Of Everything, Matthew Hedstrom

Quaker Religious Thought

No abstract provided.

The Buddha’S Great Miracle At Śrāvastī: A Translation From The Tibetan Mūlasarvāstivāda-Vinaya, David Fiordalis

Faculty Publications

This article offers an annotated translation of the story of the Buddha’s great miracle at Śrāvastī, as found in the Tibetan translation of the Mūlasarvāstivāda-vinaya. While miracles of the Buddha are many and various, the great miracle of Śrāvastī, one of the Buddha’s principal miracles, is almost the prototypical Buddhist miracle story, and the Mūlasarvāstivāda-vinaya contains a significant version of it. Yet of the many versions preserved in a variety of languages, this is one of the last to garner much scholarly attention. This article makes it more widely accessible to an interested audience, thereby contributing to the further …

On Buddhism, Divination And The Worldly Arts: Textual Evidence From The Theravāda Tradition, David Fiordalis

Faculty Publications

This essay attends to the sticky web of indigenous terminology concerning divination and other so-called “mundane” or “worldly” arts, focusing primarily upon Buddhist canonical texts preserved in Pāli, augmented by references to commentarial and exegetical literature. It asks: How have some Buddhists, as evinced in this canonical and exegetical literature, understood the broader category of “worldly arts,” which includes techniques we call divinatory? Are Buddhists discouraged from engaging with such practices, as has been commonly asserted? If so, then for whom, specifically, are such words of discouragement primarily meant? And why, specifically, are such practices discouraged? Are the penalties for …

Loneliness: Trusting God For A Way Out, Elmer L. Towns

Books

No abstract provided.

On Liturgy And Lectionary: The Word Of Life In The Body Of Christ, Martin Connell

Theology Faculty Publications

In 1843 the Catholic bishop of Philadelphia, Francis Patrick Kenrick, wrote to the Public School Board of Controllers to ask that Catholic children be spared reading of the Protestant Bible [the King James Version, KJV] and that anti-Catholic vitriol be excised from textbooks of the public schools. Historians focus on the translation divide – the Protestant King James Version versus the Catholic Douai-Rheims – but the issue closer to the heart of the matter was ritual formation (and malformation) of Christian believers, well-heeled Protestants versus poor Catholics. What happened in summer 1844, I suggest, was more accurately Rite Riots rather …

A Note On Chiasmus In Abraham 3:22-23, Julie M. Smith

Interpreter: A Journal of Latter-day Saint Faith and Scholarship

Chiasmus, or inverted parallelism, is well-known to most students of Mormon studies;1 this note explores one instance of it in Abraham 3:22-23:

Ordinary Practice As Ecclesial Holiness: Intersections Of Everyday Work, Sacrament, And Liturgy, Joshua Sweeden

Faculty Publications - Portland Seminary

No abstract provided.

Did Jesus Or Custer Die For Our Sins? Exploring The Mission Of Covenant Among Non-Western Indigenous Cultures (Chapter Five Of Covenant-Making: The Fabric Of Relationship), Randy S. Woodley

Faculty Publications - Portland Seminary

Excerpt: "Dr. Larry Shelton has become a good friend, close confidant and colleague. His interest in and promotion of North American Native theology has been clearly demonstrated over the past decade. Larry has attended most of our NAIITS (North American Institute for Indigenous Theological Studies) Symposia; created several important opportunities for dialogue; and somehow found a way to wrangle me into full-time academic work. I owe Larry a lot. I appreciate his keen theological mind, his irreverence for orthodoxy simply for orthodoxy’s sake, and his Southern mountain humor. Larry always brings out the good ol’ boy in me even when …

Front Matter

Interpreter: A Journal of Latter-day Saint Faith and Scholarship

No abstract provided.

The Christmas Quest, Hugh Nibley

Interpreter: A Journal of Latter-day Saint Faith and Scholarship

The following article from Hugh Nibley, written more than half a century ago, is a timely reminder of the contrast between empty holiday exuberance and the prospect of authentic Christmas cheer that can be provided only by the good news of “a real Savior who has really spoken with men.” This article originally appeared in Millennial Star 112/1 (January 1950), 4-5. It was reprinted in Eloquent Witness: Nibley on Himself, Others, and the Temple, edited by Stephen D. Ricks. The Collected Works of Hugh Nibley 17 (Salt Lake City, UT: Deseret Book, 2008), 121-124. Footnotes below have been added by …

Enoch And Noah On Steroids, Bryan Buchanan

Interpreter: A Journal of Latter-day Saint Faith and Scholarship

If one were to poll readers of Mormon books to find: 1. the largest and 2. the most aesthetically pleasing titles published in the last few years, I think In God’s Image and Likeness: Ancient and Modern Perspectives on the Book of Moses by Jeffrey Bradshaw (published 2010) would win on the aggregate score. The attractive tome was absolutely packed to the gills, immediately changing the face of Book of Moses studies. What was not immediately apparent, however, was that the commentary only covered part of Moses (at the bookstore where I work, when we informed people of this, the …

Full Issue

Interpreter: A Journal of Latter-day Saint Faith and Scholarship

No abstract provided.

Māori Latter-Day Saint Faith: Some Preliminary Remarks, Louis Midgley

Interpreter: A Journal of Latter-day Saint Faith and Scholarship

Marjorie Newton’s widely acclaimed Tiki and Temple1 is a history of the first century of Latter-day Saint missionary endeavors in Aotearoa/New Zealand. She tells the remarkable story of what, beginning in 1881, rapidly became essentially a Māori version of the faith of Latter-day Saints. Her fine work sets the stage for a much closer look at the deeper reasons some Māori became faithful Latter-day Saints. It turns out that Māori seers (and hence their own prophetic tradition) was, for them, commensurate with the divine special revelations brought to them by LDS missionaries. Among other things, the arcane lore taught in …

A Brief History Of Critical Text Work On The Book Of Mormon, Royal Skousen

Interpreter: A Journal of Latter-day Saint Faith and Scholarship

I begin this brief historical account of alternative work on the critical text of the Book of Mormon by including material that I wrote in an original, longer review of John S. Dinger’s Significant Textual Changes in the Book of Mormon (Smith- Pettit Foundation: Salt Lake City, Utah, 2013). The final, shorter review appears in BYU Studies 53:1 (2014). The Interpreter recently published Robert F. Smith’s review of Dinger. In these additional comments, I especially concentrate on work done in the 1970s by Stan Larson on the text of the Book of Mormon. In the latter part of this account, …

Of Tolerance And Intolerance, John Gee

Interpreter: A Journal of Latter-day Saint Faith and Scholarship

In graduate school I was disheartened to find that while the school promoted tolerance as the highest virtue, such tolerance was more often honored in the breach. Tolerance was used as an excuse for hatred and bigotry. This is because it is simply impossible to tolerate everything. One cannot tolerate both childhood innocence and pedophilia (to take an extreme example). One must choose what one will tolerate. In some cases the choice to tolerate some things will unavoidably and perhaps unintentionally cause us to cease to tolerate others.

Book Of Mormon Minimalists And The Nhm Inscriptions: A Response To Dan Vogel, Neal Rappleye, Stephen O. Smoot

Interpreter: A Journal of Latter-day Saint Faith and Scholarship

Biblical “minimalists” have sought to undermine or deemphasize the significance of the Tel Dan inscription attesting to the existence of the “house of David.” Similarly, those who might be called Book of Mormon “minimalists” such as Dan Vogel have marshaled evidence to try to make the nhm inscriptions from south Arabia, corresponding to the Book of Mormon Nahom, seem as irrelevant as possible. We show why the nhm inscriptions still stand as impressive evidence for the historicity of the Book of Mormon

Fashion Or Proof? A Challenge For Pacific Anthropology, A. Keith Thompson

Interpreter: A Journal of Latter-day Saint Faith and Scholarship

This article is a call to Pacific anthropologists to write the story of the origin of mankind in the Pacific a bit larger and perhaps to look scientifically for additional explanations. Is it possible that the early diffusionists may have gotten some things right, albeit for the wrong reasons?

The Sibling Scandals Of The Resurrection, Daniel C. Peterson

Interpreter: A Journal of Latter-day Saint Faith and Scholarship

I’ve recently picked Stephen T. Davis’s Risen Indeed: Making Sense of the Resurrection up again.1 It’s an impressive book that had a pivotal effect on my thinking when it first appeared. Davis, the Russell K. Pitzer Professor of Philosophy at Claremont McKenna College in California, argues that “Christians are within their intellectual rights in believing that Jesus was raised from the dead.”2 “The thesis of the book,” he explains, “is that the two central Christian resurrection claims — namely, that Jesus was bodily raised from the dead and that we will all be raised from the dead — are defensible …

Understanding Nephi With The Help Of Noah Webster, Loren Blake Spendlove

Interpreter: A Journal of Latter-day Saint Faith and Scholarship

Dictionaries, especially Noah Webster’s 1828 American Dictionary of the English Language, can be useful and informative resources to help us better understand the language of the Book of Mormon. This article compares definitions of words and phrases found in the book of 1 Nephi, using Webster’s 1828 dictionary and the New Oxford American Dictionary as references. By comparing these two dictionaries, we can see how word usage and meanings have changed since the original publication of the Book of Mormon in 1830. We can also gain a greater appreciation of the text of the Book of Mormon in a way …

Big Trouble In River City: American Crucifixion And The Defaming Of Joseph Smith, Craig L. Foster, Brian C. Hales

Interpreter: A Journal of Latter-day Saint Faith and Scholarship

On April 22, 2014, PublicAffairs, an imprint of a national publisher Persues Books Group, released American Crucifixion: The Murder of Joseph Smith and the Fate of the Mormon Church, authored by Alex Beam. Beam, who openly declared he entered the project without personal biases against Joseph Smith or the Latter-day Saints, spent a couple of years researching his work, which he declares to be “popular non-fiction” and therefore historically accurate. This article challenges both of these assertions, showing that Beam was highly prejudiced against the Church prior to investigating and writing about events leading up to the martyrdom. In addition, …

Front Matter

Interpreter: A Journal of Latter-day Saint Faith and Scholarship

No abstract provided.

Reason, Experience, And The Existence Of God, Daniel C. Peterson

Interpreter: A Journal of Latter-day Saint Faith and Scholarship

Both reason and experience are essential to religious life, which should be neither completely irrational nor entirely cerebral. But surely, of the two, the experience of direct and convincing revelation would and should trump academic debate, and most obviously so for its recipient. The Interpreter Foundation was established in the conviction that reasoned discussion and analysis necessarily have a place in faithful discipleship, but also in the confidence that divine revelation has genuinely occurred. The role of reason, accordingly, is a helpful one. It serves an important ancillary function. However, it does not supplant experience with God and the divine …

“War Of Words And Tumult Of Opinions”: The Battle For Joseph Smith’S Words In Book Of Mormon Geography, Neal Rappleye

Interpreter: A Journal of Latter-day Saint Faith and Scholarship

Review of John L. Lund. Joseph Smith and the Geography of the Book of Mormon. The Communications Company, 2012. 209 pp. + xviii, including index.

In the midst of this war of words and tumult of opinions, I often said to myself: What is to be done? Who of all these parties are right; or, are they all wrong together? If any one of them be right, which is it, and how shall I know it? –Joseph Smith Jr.1

The Book With The Unintentionally Self-Referential Title, Brant A. Gardner

Interpreter: A Journal of Latter-day Saint Faith and Scholarship

Earl M. Wunderli has written a book that works through the reasons he fell out of belief in the Book of Mormon. These are combined with issues that he has added to his original reasons. His presentation is clearly intended to suggest that what he found compelling will also be compelling to other readers. Should it? This review looks at how his arguments are constructed: his methodology, the logic of the analysis, and the way he uses his sources. Although he argues that it is the Book of Mormon that is the imperfect book, his construction of the arguments makes …

Changes In The Book Of Mormon, Royal Skousen

Interpreter: A Journal of Latter-day Saint Faith and Scholarship

I originally gave this presentation in August 2002 at the LDS FAIR conference held in Orem, Utah. A transcript of this paper, based on the 2002 version, appears online at www.fairmormon.org. Since then I have published updated versions of the first half of that original presentation. The most recent history of the Book of Mormon critical text project can be found in my article “The Original Text of the Book of Mormon and its Publication by Yale University Press”, published in 2013 in Interpreter: A Journal of Mormon Scripture, volume 7, pages 57-96. Until now, I have not published a …