The King Follett Sermon

2020 ◽  
pp. 59-88
Author(s):  
William L. Davis
Keyword(s):  
Detailed Analysis ◽  
Historical Context ◽  
General Outline ◽  
Joseph Smith ◽  
Book Of Mormon ◽  
Spiritual Autobiographies ◽  
The Common ◽  
The Moment ◽  
Written Compositions ◽  
Oral Composition

Chapter Four provides a detailed analysis of Joseph Smith's famous funeral sermon, the King Follett discourse. The auditors' notes for this sermon reveal Smith's semi-extemporaneous preaching technique, which combines advanced preparation in the general outline of the sermon with the extemporaneous delivery of words in the moment of performance. The sermon also reveals Smith's familiarity with the common "doctrine and use" sermon pattern, as well as his use of resumptive repetition, concealed heads, and mnemonic cues. Turning to the sermon notes of Baptist preacher Abraham Marshall, the chapter continues with a discussion of mnemonic cues by illustrating the preaching technique of creating condensed, succinct sermon outlines, known as short notes, briefs, or sketches, which preachers extemporaneously amplified into fully developed sermons in the moment of performance. Finally, the chapter explores how Methodist preachers adapted these preaching techniques to structure their written compositions, with an emphasis on spiritual autobiographies. These oral and written techniques provide a historical context for understanding how Joseph Smith applied the same methodology in the construction and oral composition of the Book of Mormon.

Epilogue

2020 ◽  
pp. 193-196
Author(s):  
William L. Davis
Keyword(s):  
Alternative View ◽  
Oral Performance ◽  
Future Studies ◽  
Joseph Smith ◽  
Book Of Mormon ◽  
The Creation ◽  
Oral Composition

The epilogue concludes the study with a brief review of the role of oral composition and oral performance in the creation of the Book of Mormon, along with providing suggestions for future studies. The chapter challenges hagiographic tropes that portray Joseph Smith as an uneducated, illiterate farm boy, offering instead an alternative view of an ambitious young man seeking to improve his humble status and to fulfil his belief that he was destined to become a prophet of God. The epilogue ends with a review of Smith's legacy and how the Book of Mormon remains the foundational text of his movement.

Constructing Book of Mormon Historical Narratives

2020 ◽  
pp. 122-159
Author(s):  
William L. Davis
Keyword(s):  
Historical Narratives ◽  
Story Structure ◽  
Book Of Mormon ◽  
External Evidence ◽  
The Moment ◽  
Oral Composition ◽  
Advance Knowledge

Chapter Six explores Smith's use of story outlines as the narrative anchors for his oral composition of the Book of Mormon. By reviewing the sketch outlines, or "skeletons," of stories in advance of his dictation sessions, Smith could use such outlines as a mental guide, which he expanded extemporaneously into fully developed narratives in the moment of delivery. The original Book of Mormon summary headings for internal books, chapters, and sections provide explicit examples of this method of oral composition. Smith dictated the outlines of stories before dictating the stories themselves, revealing his advance knowledge of the narrative shape and structure of his stories, which he expanded extemporaneously during dictation to his scribes. This chapter also challenges the apologetic claim that such outlines represent ancient colophons, along with exploring Smith's use of mnemonic cues and embedded outlines. Finally, based on internal and external evidence, the chapter argues that Smith was fully aware of the overall story structure of the Book of Mormon before he started dictating the work.

Textual Criticism and the Book of Mormon

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Grant Hardy
Keyword(s):  
Detailed Analysis ◽  
Driving Force ◽  
Textual Criticism ◽  
Joseph Smith ◽  
Brigham Young University ◽  
Book Of Mormon

The last several decades have seen the emergence of academically rigorous textual criticism of the Book of Mormon. This scholarly development has largely been based on a detailed analysis of the two earliest manuscripts and twenty of the most significant printed editions. Royal Skousen, a linguist at Brigham Young University, has been the driving force behind these efforts, which have culminated in the publication of multi-volume textual commentaries, photographical and typographical facsimiles of the manuscripts, and a reconstructed earliest version. Grant Hardy, in his “Textual Criticism and the Book of Mormon,” presents how these invaluable studies can be used by scholars to provide clues about the 1829 translation/dictation process of Joseph Smith and his scribes, the transmission of text, details of the narrative, and Smith’s attitudes toward the scripture he produced.

Esotericism and the “Coded Word” in Mormonism

2011 ◽  
Vol 2 (1) ◽  
pp. 29-54
Author(s):  
Clyde Forsberg Jr.
Keyword(s):  
Popular Religion ◽  
Latter Day Saints ◽  
Social Commentary ◽  
Joseph Smith ◽  
Playing Field ◽  
Book Of Mormon ◽  
Divine Inspiration ◽  
History Of ◽  
New Interpretation ◽  
New Religion

In the history of American popular religion, the Latter-day Saints, or Mormons, have undergone a series of paradigmatic shifts in order to join the Christian mainstream, abandoning such controversial core doctrines and institutions as polygamy and the political kingdom of God. Mormon historians have played an important role in this metamorphosis, employing a version (if not perversion) of the Church-Sect Dichotomy to change the past in order to control the future, arguing, in effect, that founder Joseph Smith Jr’s erstwhile magical beliefs and practices gave way to a more “mature” and bible-based self-understanding which is then said to best describe the religion that he founded in 1830. However, an “esoteric approach” as Faivre and Hanegraaff understand the term has much to offer the study of Mormonism as an old, new religion and the basis for a more even methodological playing field and new interpretation of Mormonism as equally magical (Masonic) and biblical (Evangelical) despite appearances. This article will focus on early Mormonism’s fascination with and employment of ciphers, or “the coded word,” essential to such foundation texts as the Book of Mormon and “Book of Abraham,” as well as the somewhat contradictory, albeit colonial understanding of African character and destiny in these two hermetic works of divine inspiration and social commentary in the Latter-day Saint canonical tradition.

Priesthood Ordination

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jonathan A. Stapley
Keyword(s):  
Nineteenth Century ◽  
Black Men ◽  
Church Leaders ◽  
Men And Women ◽  
Joseph Smith ◽  
Book Of Mormon ◽  
The Temple ◽  
The Church ◽  
Power And Authority

Early Mormons used the Book of Mormon as the basis for their ecclesiology and understanding of the open heaven. Church leaders edited, harmonized, and published Joseph Smith’s revelation texts, expanding understandings of ecclesiastical priesthood office. Joseph Smith then revealed the Nauvoo Temple liturgy, with its cosmology that equated heaven, kinship, and priesthood. This cosmological priesthood was materialized through sealings at the temple altar and was the context for expansive teachings incorporating women into priesthood. This cosmology was also the basis for polygamy, temple adoption, and restrictions on the participation of black men and women in the church. This framework gave way at the end of the nineteenth century to a new priesthood cosmology introduced by Joseph F. Smith based on male ecclesiastical office. As church leaders expanded the meaning of priesthood to comprise the entire power and authority of God, they struggled to integrate women into church cosmology.

St Gregory of Nyssa

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
John Anthony McGuckin
Keyword(s):  
Historical Context ◽  
Family Members ◽  
General Outline ◽  
Gregory Of Nyssa ◽  
Christian Leaders ◽  
Close Family

Chapter 1 gives Biographical background and studies the historical context(s) of Gregory of Nyssa and his close family members, situating them as aristocratic and long-established Christian leaders of the Cappadocian area. It offers along with the course of Gregory’s Vita a general outline of the main philosophical and religious controversies of his era, particularly his ecclesiastical involvement in the Neo-Nicene apologetical movement associated with the leadership of his brother Basil (of Caesarea), which he himself inherited in Cappadocia, with imperial approval, after 380. It concludes with a review of Gregory’s significance as author: in terms of his style as a writer, his work as an exegete, his body of spiritual teaching, and lastly, the manner in which his reputation waxed and waned from antiquity to the present.

Trouble Enough: Joseph Smith and the Book of Mormon

1986 ◽  
Vol 25 (2) ◽  
pp. 268
Author(s):  
Gordon Shepherd ◽  
Ernest H. Taves
Keyword(s):  
Joseph Smith ◽  
Book Of Mormon

scholarly journals Religion and Revolution: Joseph Smith, Abraham Lincoln, and the Book of Mormon

2021 ◽  
Vol 4 (2) ◽  
pp. p42
Author(s):  
Sri Michael Das
Keyword(s):  
Abraham Lincoln ◽  
Important Task ◽  
Latter Day Saints ◽  
Human History ◽  
Joseph Smith ◽  
Book Of Mormon ◽  
False Prophet ◽  
Con Artist

The name Joseph Smith, b. 23 December 1803, d. 27 June, 1844 invokes words like heretic, false prophet, con artist and fruitcake. No stranger to con artistry or the interior of a prisoner cell, Smith was arrested numerous times on legitimate charges, he also accomplished something no other Prophet did: developed the character and strategies for First Citizen of Humanity, Abraham Lincoln and helped start a War Between the States that enslaved men might be free. Though he never lived to see his Book of Mormon accomplish its ends, he, along with the Latter Day Saints were never given recognition, not even informally for this, humankind’s the most important task. The most important in human history. In this paper I detail important elements of Smith’s and his Church’s work and also illuminate his ties to Mr. Lincoln, and mourn the wayward Church of today. Perhaps revisiting Mister Smith’s Vision will reignite all of us and cause us to rise up and wage one more War against tyranny, weaponry, waste, abuse, neglect, and utter ignorance of our innate spiritual principals.

scholarly journals Review of the Literature on Latin America in Ketab-e-Jom’eh

2019 ◽  
Vol 7 (1) ◽  
pp. 1
Author(s):  
Jom’ehToloo Riazi
Keyword(s):  
Latin American ◽  
Historical Context ◽  
Influential Factors ◽  
Review Of The Literature ◽  
Literature And Society ◽  
Revolutionary Movements ◽  
The Moment ◽  
Interpretative Approach ◽  
Symbolic Approach ◽  
Selection Of

This paper aims to analyze a weekly magazine called Ketab-e-Jom’eh (Friday’s Book) and the reflection of Latin American’s revolutionary movements in it. Ketab-e-Jom’eh, published from July 26, 1979, to May 22, 1980, was supervised by a number of the most legendary Iranian authors and poets, such as Ahmad Shamloo1 and Gholam Hossein Saedi. I focus on the way a particular perspective on Latin American movements is constructed and perpetuated among Ketab-e-Jom’eh’s lectors. With a symbolic approach, I analyze those texts through their symbolic representation in the Iranian society, which requires me to study those symbols and their concomitant relevance in Iran. Eventually, I will use an interpretative approach to examine this magazine’s ideologically motivated articles in the broader context of the Iranian society with its particular traits. The dialectic relationship between literature and society helps us understand literature as the product of social conditions and influential factors in society. The position that I develop here echoes Louis de Bonald’s belief that “through a careful reading of any nation’s literature ‘one could tell what this people had been’” (as cited in Hall, 1979, p. 13). I employ such an expansive horizon to scrutinize the selection of literature on Latin American guerillas. I shall unfold the magazine’s ideological orientation from the angle of the context in which it is used. I aim to show that the historical context of the Iranian society at the moment gives those articles specific meanings. In pursuit of my goals, I will recontextualize the articles to determine their primary significance in the Iran of the 1970s and 1980s.

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