Do you happen to have data on murder rates among active UUs vs active LDS? I for one have seen the murder rate skyrocket in my ward.

After reading your review, I stand by my own. We just disagree on the value of Krakauer’s work. I would characterize most of your criticisms as minor and of little consequence to the larger point Krakauer was making and the story he was telling (Btw, you misspell Mark Hofmann’s last name–one “f.” A common error, and no more trivial than some of the things you criticize Krakauer for getting wrong.) I don’t view his book as an attack on the modern LDS church; rather, it serves as a warning about the potential consequences of religious zealotry and relying on personal revelation from the “Spirit” to trump reason and morality. The description that Dan Lafferty provides of his state of mind when he committed the murders is eerily similar to what we read about in the Book of Mormon with Nephi slaying Laban. That is not a coincidence. That Ron Lafferty was in all respects a normal, typical mainstream Mormon who rather quickly turned to fundamentalism and fanaticism is a fact worthy of examination and exposition. The mainstream church’s emphasis on authority–and the use of history as a basis for that authority–and the moral relativism found in the Book of Mormon and Mormon history coupled with a culture in which individuals are taught that God speaks to them through spiritual feelings all combine to provide a catalyst for the Lafferty brothers’ actions. Not all religions provide the impetus for religiously motivated violence. And Mormonism is not unique in this regard. You won’t find any religiously motivate murderers among the Unitarian Universalists, for example. What is interesting to me is that 19th-century Mormonism produced a fair amount of religiously motivated violence. The church liberalized in the mid-twentieth century and we didn’t see this sort of thing. In recent years, the LDS church has swung back toward a more fundamentalist culture, and we see this sort of thing with apparently greater frequency. I think this sort of thing points tot he urgency and importance of liberalizing the current church culture. It’s not just about losing intellectuals and feminists to other faith traditions; it may literally be a matter of life and death.

Do you believe Ms. Beck’s allegations? I do and I think what happened to her is horrific and may be more common in the Church than we might think.

But does he talk about ballroom dancing?

Last I heard on the Turley/Walker/Leonard MMM book was that there was too much for one book, and they are producing 2. One will be the History, and one will focus on the Legal pieces post-MMM. The History book will be published first, and should be pretty close.

So what are your thoughts on Givens?

Bagley heaps much praise on Juanita Brooks and her MMM book, and sees his own tome not as a revision, but an update of Brooks. I think it should be read in conjunction with Brooks. Just as Bushman, Vogel et al have updated, but not necessarily reversed Brodie, Bagley updates Brooks.

I’ll be interested to see what Turley/Walker/Leonard’s treatment has to say. Is that thing ever going to come out?

BYU Archive Address for this is:
http://contentdm.lib.byu.edu/cgi-bin/docviewer.exe?CISOROOT=/NCMP1820-1846&CISOPTR=2812

BYU Archive Address for this is:
http://contentdm.lib.byu.edu/cgi-bin/docviewer.exe?CISOROOT=/NCMP1820-1846&CISOPTR=2812

Jamie Trwth

I still chortle with the juxtaposition: children of God mean as the devil….

Equality, what has steered me away from reading Bagley’s book isn’t that I think it’s just a conspiracy theory. I’ve read most of what the Tanner’s published, Martha Beck’s book, Krakauer’s book, and many others. I haven’t been very interested in it, because I consider Bagley himself to be a bit out there. I understand that he believes that Brigham Young had a plan to actually subvert the US government and take over. I’m sure that it appears well researched and all if you look at the bio, but come on.

I heartily agree about Dan Vogel’s Joseph Smith: The Making of a Prophet. What I love about that book is the biography of the Book of Mormon. Every other biography writes off the period of time spent translating, simply noting that time was spent translating. Vogel actually offers a specific and rigorous chronology that is related to events in Joseph’s life. This is, perhaps, the most ambitious project in Mormon Studies in the past two decades, and he pulls it off in spades.

Of the Metcalfe and Vogel edited essays on Mormon Scripture, all the ones that I’ve read are excellent. I think that New Approaches is the best one. American Apocrypha and The Word of God are also excellent. I haven’t read Line upon Line.

As far as the Book of Mormon, the idea was to talk about books that many listeners would not have read. I, for one, assume that the listeners have read the Book of Mormon. If not, then I’d have assembled a different list.

One can read the stuff in the FARMS review that RT mentions, but I tend to think that it’s very uneven in quality, and that even the best stuff is not that good.

Heber J Grant called “Children of God” “Mean as the devil” and considered it anti-mormon.

I am surprised no one has mentioned Ed Kimball’s bigraphies of his father. They are pretty great. Also, everything I’ve read by Terryl Givens, I’ve loved.

For people who want to dig into battles over historicity, Metcalfe’s edited volume as well as the Vogel and Metcalfe volume are unavoidable. As also are various FARMS volumes certainly including some of Welch’s work on chiasmus, the volume on warfare, Sorenson’s geography hypothesis, etc. The debate is notoriously a mess, as both sides are sometimes seemingly willfully ignorant of each other’s claims and evidence. How much do these books contribute to exegesis? In my view very little. Most of this scholarship is so overwhelmed with the problem of historicity that the mere text vanishes in the mist.

I just listened to the rest of the podcast. I put my plug in for Krakauer before hearing David blast him. I disagree that Krakauer gets almost everything wrong about the mainstream church. There are some minor errors, most of which have been corrected in later editions of the book. Indeed, the version I have includes an appendix in which Krakauer prints in its entirety a blistering review from Richard Turley (a church employee). Krakauer then responds to Turley’s criticisms. I had put off reading the book because of an interview I heard on NPR with Turley and Krakauer when the book first came out. Turley made it sound like Krakauer was just using his study of the Laffertys as an excuse to attack religion generally. Having now read the book, I don’t think that’s what Krakauer does at all. Instead, Krakauer is pointing out the potential consequences of black-and-white, all-or-nothing thinking in religion. In telling the story of the Lafferty brothers, he is sounding a warning that I think liberal Mormons would embrace.

I agree with you on Bagley’s book. I think a lot of Mormons dismiss it out of hand or would make disparaging comments about Bagley being a “fringe historian,” ahem, but tit is much more than simply a “Brigham was in on it” book-length conspiratorial screed. It is well researched and well written, and provides a lot of the “context” that Ann and you were saying is necessary to understand the MMM (see episode 3 of Mormon Matters). The background on the Fancher party is nicely done. Certainly, Brooks’ master work should also be read.

I am wondering: what would the panelists (and commenters here) recommend on the Book of Mormon? Is anything by Nibley still relevant? Welch? What about Brent Metcalfe’s stuff? I know you were mainly discussing Mormon historical works and books that examine the church as an institution but you did mention a book discussing Mormon theology. What about exegetical works?

Jan Shipps’s Sojourner in the Promised Land: Forty Years Among the Mormons is just a wonderful colletion of Shipps’s writings on Mormonism over the years. Many of the essays appear in this collection for the first time. What a blessing Jan has been to the study of Mormonism. I like what one Amazon reviewer says of this book: “Reads like a combination of a coffee shop intimate chat and a stimulating history lecture. Mrs. Shipps writes clearly and engagingly about the evolving process of the LDS faith. I was engrossed the whole way through.”

The Wilderness of Faith: Essays on Contemporary Mormon Thought John Sillito, editor, is probably my favorite of the Signature Books “Essays on Mormonism” series. (Although I havn’t read them all.) Unfortunately it is out of print, but I always see copies available at Benchmark Books or online. See: http://www.signaturebooks.com/outofprint/wilderne.htm for more details. Philip Barlow’s fine volume A Thoughtful Faith collects personal faith stories from many big name LDS scholars, but all of them eventually settle down on the faithful side of the fence. The essayists in Sillito’s The Wilderness of Faith are not so uniformly represented. Some reconciled their faith and remain active LDS, others left the church, and others are somewhere in between, but all of their faith journeys are fascinating. TWoF reads like a Sunstone “Pillars of My Faith” greatest hits. Essayists include: Lavina Fielding Anderson; Arthur R. Bassett; Irene M. Bates; Elouise M. Bell; Hugh B. Brown; D. Jeff Burton; Richard J. Cummings; Edwin B. Firmage; Scott G. Kenney; Betina Lindsey; Ron Molen; L. Jackson Newell; Levi S. Peterson; Linda Sillitoe; Susan B. Taber; and Donlu D. Thayer.

Equality, I agree with most of your recommendations, as well. I think that Bagley overstates the case for Young’s direct involvement in MMM, but the book is a worthwhile update on Brooks — although I’d say you should read Brooks first. Salamander is a great read. I also agree with you about Krakauer’s book — with caveats. Krakauer should be disregarded when he starts speaking about religion in general, and he shouldn’t be taken too seriously when he talks about non-fundamentalist Mormonism. But his work with the Lafferty crimes is fascinating and well worth the read, in my opinion.