Religion Commons^™

Bible: The Story Of The King James Version, 1611-2011; Begat: The Story Of The King James Bible And The English Language, Gordon Campbell, David Crystal, Brandie R. Siegfried

BYU Studies

GORDON CAMPBELL. Bible: The Story of the King James Version, 1611-2011. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2010

DAVID CRYSTAL. Begat: The Story of the King James Bible and the English Language. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2010

We are celebrating the four hundredth anniversary of the first publication of the King James Version of the Bible, and Oxford University Press has published several books in support of that commemoration. I review two such here, both of which are intended for a general readership, well worth reading on a quiet Sunday afternoon. Each book provides a historical framework for understanding the continued influence …

Almost Christian: What The Faith Of Our Teenagers Is Telling The American Church, Cardell K. Jacobson, Linda C. Dean

BYU Studies

Members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints were pleased about the results of a landmark study of the religiosity of the nation's youth, called the National Study of Youth and Religion (NSYR). Conducted from 2003 to 2005 by Christian Smith and others, the study was first reported in Soul Searching: The Religious and Spiritual Lives of American Teenagers, published by Oxford University Press in 2005. (To read the book review of Soul Searching, see BYU Studies 45, no. 2 [2006]: 167-172.)

The current book, Almost Christian, by Linda Creasy Dean, is a follow-up from the same study. …

Mormons As Citizens Of A Communist State: A Documentary History Of The Church Of Jesus Christ Of Latter-Day Saints In East Germany, 1945–1990, Raymond Kuehne, Norma S. Davis

BYU Studies

From 2002 to 2004, Kuehne served a second mission with his wife in the Freiberg Germany Temple. There he met Henry Burkhardt, who had served as a counselor in the North German Mission presidency for some thirty-eight years and was the first president of the Freiberg Temple. When Kuehne heard Burkhardt speak to the temple workers concerning the history behind the building of the temple, he wanted to read more on the subject. He was told that, although this temple was the only one built in a Communist country, very little had been published on the subject. Burkhardt gave Kuehne …

Nauvoo Polygamy: " . . But We Called It Celestial Marriage", Thomas G. Alexander

BYU Studies

Although focusing on the introduction of plural marriage by Joseph Smith, Nauvoo Polygamy is also an analysis of the background of pre-Mormon polygamy, a consideration of the expansion of the institution, and the testimony of those who entered it. Significantly, it is the first attempt since Todd Compton's In Sacred Loneliness to provide a critical list and analysis of the women whom Joseph married. It is not, however, an attempt to provide a statistical analysis of plural marriage, and its consideration of the operation of plural family life is much shorter than we find in the works of Kathryn Daynes …

Book Review: Religion Crossing Boundaries: Transnational Religious And Social Dynamics In Africa And The New African Diaspora, Akanmu Adebayo

Journal of Global Initiatives: Policy, Pedagogy, Perspective

Review of Religion Crossing Boundaries: Transnational Religious and Social Dynamics in Africa and the New African Diaspora, by James Spickard and Afe Adogame. (2010). Leiden: E.J. Brill; ISBN-I0: 90-04-18730-8

Book Reviews

Liberty Theological Review

Review by Shane Kraeger of Exegetical Guide to the Greek New Testament: Colossians and Philemon. by Murray J. Harris. Nashville: B&H Academic, 2010. xxxii + 272 pp., $24.99.

Review by Joshua C. Stone of To Change the World: The Irony, Tragedy, and Possibility of Christianity in the Late Modern World by James Davison Hunter. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2010, 358pp., $27.95.

Review by R. Lee Webb of Interpreting the Psalms for Teaching and Preaching. Eds. Herbert W. Bateman IV and D. Brent Sandy. St. Louis: Chalice Press, 2010, 292 pp., $34.99.

Review by Roberto Rodriguez-Nunez of Augustine as …

American Grace: How Religion Divides And Unites Us, James W. Phillips, Robert D. Putnam, David E. Campbell, Shaylyn R. Garrett

BYU Studies

American Grace is the next pivotal work within the social scientific study of religion that LDS readers should find interesting on many levels, including the extensive attention it gives to Mormonism. In this work, Robert Putnam (author of the national bestseller Bowling Alone) teams up with David Campbell (editor of A Matter of Faith: Religion in the 2004 Presidential Election) and field researcher Shayln Romney Garrett to examine the many facets of contemporary American religious pluralism. The authors use data from the nationally representative 2006 and 2007 waves of the Faith Matters survey, in addition to other surveys, …

Invitation To World Missions: A Trinitarian Missiology For The Twenty-First Century (Book Review), Wayne A. Kobes

Pro Rege

Reviewed Title: Tennent, Timothy C. Invitation to World Missions: A Trinitarian Missiology for the Twenty-first Century. Invitation to Theological Studies Series. Grand Rapids, MI: Kregel Academic and Professional, 2010. 559 pages. ISBN: 978-0-8254-3883-7.

Review Of Missionaries And Their Medicine, Chad M. Bauman

Scholarship and Professional Work - LAS

A review of Missionaries And Their Medicine: A Christian Modernity for Tribal India, by David Hardiman, Manchester University Press, 2008.

The Book Of Mormon: The Earliest Text, Robert L. Maxwell, Royal Skousen

BYU Studies

The Book of Mormon: The Earliest Text begins with a twenty-two-page introduction by Grant Hardy about the nature and coming forth of the Book of Mormon, together with an inviting call for the further study of that book within LDS, American, and world contexts; and also with a seventeen-page editor's preface by Skousen, describing the nature of the Book of Mormon text and the goals and typographical conventions of this "Yale Edition." The bulk of the book (1-738) consists of a presentation of the complete text of the Book of Mormon itself, a stemma showing the genealogy of the various …

Eliza R. Snow: The Complete Poetry, Karen L. Davidson, Susan E. Howe, Jill Mulvay Derr

BYU Studies

It is unfortunate but nevertheless true that most of today's educated readers do not understand, are indifferent to, or even dislike poetry. Given that fact, many readers might pass up Eliza R. Snow: The Complete Poetry without so much as a glance at its contents. That would be a mistake. In preparing this comprehensive collection of Eliza R. Snow's poetry, editors Jill Mulvay Derr and Karen Lynn Davidson have rightly understood that Eliza's writings have great significance in their relationship to her personal life as well as the religious and historical events to which she was responding. Derr and Davidson …

A Search For Place: Eight Generations Of Henrys And The Settlement Of Utah's Uintah Basin, David S. Carpenter, F. Lamond Tullis

BYU Studies

LaMond Tullis, emeritus professor of political science at Brigham Young University and author of Mormons in Mexico and Lord and Peasant in Peru, among other works, tries in his latest book to put his ancestors in their rightful place. He tells the story of the Henrys, from the Scotch-Irish John Henry who settled in Rhode Island in the late 1600s down to the generation of his mother's family, who settled in the Uintah Basin. Migrating from New England through New York to the Midwest and the Rocky Mountains, these westering Henrys are placed by Tullis into larger contexts, their stories …

Hole In Our Gospel: The Answer That Changed My Life And Might Just Change The World (Book Review), Abby M. Foreman

Pro Rege

Reviewed Title: Stearns, Richard. The Hole in our Gospel: The Answer that Changed my Life and Might Just Change the World. Nashville, TN: Thomas Nelson, 2010. ISBN: 0849947001.

Revolution Of The Mind: Radical Enlightenment And The Intellectual Origins Of Modern Democracy And The Reformation Of Rights: Law, Religion And Human Rights In Early Modern Calvinism (Book Reviews), Keith C. Sewell

Pro Rege

Reviewed Titles: Israel, Jonathan I. A Revolution of the Mind: Radical Enlightenment and the Intellectual Origins of Modern Democracy. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2010. 276 pages. ISBN-13: 978-0-69114200-5. Witte, John, Jr. The Reformation of Rights: Law, Religion and Human Rights in Early Modern Calvinism. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2007. 388 pages including bibliography. ISBN-13: 978-0-521-81842-1.

When Helping Hurts: How To Alleviate Poverty Without Hurting The Poor And Yourself (Book Review), John Visser

Pro Rege

Reviewed Title: Corbett, Steve, and Brian Fikkert. When Helping Hurts: How to Alleviate Poverty Without Hurting the Poor and Yourself. Chicago: Moody, 2009. 230 pages. ISBN:978-0-8024-5705-9.

To Change The World: The Irony, Tragedy, And Possibility Of Christianity In The Late Modern World (Book Review), Daniel Edward Young

Pro Rege

Reviewed Title: Hunter, James Davison. To Change the World: The Irony, Tragedy, and Possibility of Christianity in the Late Modern World. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2010. 358 pages. ISBN: 978-0-19-973080-3.

Routes Of Learning: Highways, Pathways, And Byways In The History Of Mathematics (Book Review), Calvin Jongsma

Faculty Work Comprehensive List

Reviewed Title: Routes of Learning: Highways, Pathways, and Byways in the History of Mathematics by Ivor Grattan-Guinness. Baltimore, MD: The Johns Hopkins University Press, 2009. xii + 372 pages, with index. ISBN: 9780801892486.

Political Theology In A Postsecularist Key, Brent A. R. Hege

Scholarship and Professional Work - LAS

A review of Clayton Crockett, Radical Political Theology: Religion and Politics after Liberalism. Insurrections: Critical Studies in Religion, Politics, and Culture. New York: Columbia University Press, 2011. $50.00 216 pp. ISBN: 9780231149822

God And Sex: What The Bible Really Says, Michael Coogan, Eric A. Eliason

BYU Studies

Once, while serving as a military chaplain, I attended a training event in Colorado Springs. There we toured the world headquarters of the Evangelical "Focus on the Family" ministry. Our friendly guide explained to us that their organization existed to promote the "biblical model" of the family in the modern world. A cheeky question popped into to my mind: "By 'biblical model' do you mean the polygamy practiced in the Old Testament, or the celibacy encouraged in the New Testament?" But I held my tongue, as I wanted to be a polite guest. But since this event, I have often …

Book Review: Understanding The Book Of Mormon, Terryl Givens

English Faculty Publications

With over 150 million copies in circulation, the Book of Mormon has yet to find its niche in historical, religious or literary studies. Largely ignored by scholars and berated by Evangelicals, the text may find a more successful path to a larger audience, hopes historian Grant Hardy, if historical and religious questions are bracketed in deference to the work’s surprisingly complex and interesting literary dimensions

Review Of Neeti Nair's Changing Homelands: Hindu Politics And The Partition Of India, Geoffrey Kain

Publications

“As Neeti Nair concludes chapter 5 of her extremely impressive study of the Partition of India, Changing Homelands, she argues against the pat inclusion of Partition on a ‘trans-national’ list of ‘genocidal conflicts’ …”

Muhammad: Prophet Of God, Thora Qaddumi, Daniel C. Peterson

BYU Studies

Islamic studies scholar Daniel C. Peterson has written a small book that speaks volumes about the man who, in about the year AD 610, while meditating in a cave near Mecca in Arabia, received a prophetic call that led to the establishment of a religion that today is claimed by almost a quarter of the world's inhabitants. It adds to the growing body of research by Peterson and other Latter-day Saint scholars that strengthens the Church's role as a voice of reason in an area rife with misunderstandings and ignorance--the Islamic world.

Although written from a strongly academic and scholarly …

Randi L. Rashkover And Martin Kavka, Eds., Tradition The Public Square: A David Novak Reader, Colby Dickinson

Theology: Faculty Publications and Other Works

This article reviews the book Tradition the Public Square: A David Novak Reader, edited by Randi L. Rashkover and Martin Kavka .

Mario L. Aguilar, Contemplating God, Changing The World, Colby Dickinson

Theology: Faculty Publications and Other Works

This article reviews the book Contemplating God, Changing the World, by Mario L. Aguilar.

The Faith Instinct: How Religion Evolved And Why It Endures, Brian Jackson, Nicholas Wade

BYU Studies

"People of faith may not warm to the view that the mind's receptivity to religion has been shaped by evolution," writes Nicholas Wade, science writer for the New York Times, in his new book The Faith Instinct. If religion evolves with cultural circumstances, then it loses some of its immutable, supernatural qualities. On the other hand, atheists "may not embrace the idea that religious behavior evolved because it conferred essential benefits on ancient societies and their successors." If we accept the proposition that faith endures because cultures select it (perhaps unconsciously) as a necessary attribute of their survival, then we …

Excavating Nauvoo: The Mormons And The Rise Of Historical Archaeology In America, Richard K. Talbot, Benjamin C. Pykles

BYU Studies

During a recent coordination meeting, an archaeologist employed by the state of Utah tried to explain how the science of archaeology can help Native Americans to know their history. In response, one of the Native American participants exclaimed, "We already know our history!" This statement sheds light on tensions that arise when reconstructing the past. To those living in a postmodern world, history can serve many purposes and many masters; for this particular Native American, the oral history that had been passed down generationally to her presented her past in a context and form with which she was accustomed and …

Backyard Alchemy, Casualene Meyer, Lance E. Larsen

BYU Studies

Fatherhood is an immediate, fruitful theme in Lance Larsen's Backyard Alchemy, from the title with its combination of hominess and intellectual magic to the dedication page honoring his wife, Jacqui, and his recently deceased father, Veryl Larsen. Several poems in Larsen's book feature fathers, inviting readers to ponder the subject.

Apocalypse And Allegiance: Worship, Politics And Devotion In The Book Of Revelation (Book Review), Syd Hielema

Pro Rege

Reviewed Title: Kraybill, J. Nelson. Apocalypse and Allegiance: Worship, Politics and Devotion in the Book of Revelation. Grand Rapids: Brazos Press, 2010. 224 pages. ISBN: 978-1-587432-61-3.

Wow! What A Ride! A Journey With Cancer (Book Review), Pam Adams

Pro Rege

Reviewed Title: Bosma, Cella. Wow! What a Ride! A Journey with Cancer. Sioux Center, IA: Dordt College Press, 2010. 274 pages. ISBN: 978-0-932914-84-2.

Living At The Crossroads: An Introduction To Christian Worldview (Book Review), Wayne A. Kobes

Pro Rege

Reviewed Title: Goheen, Michael W. and Craig G. Bartholomew. Living at the Crossroads: An Introduction to Christian Worldview. Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2008. 205 pp. ISBN: 978-0-8010-3140-3.