Religiously Motivated Coverups

And you thought I was going to say something about Mountain Meadows, right?

Nope.  I am not feeling serious today.

A Particle of Faith

I sometimes hear folks at church distinguish themselves from other Christians by asserting a difference between the LDS “I know that…” and the non-LDS “I believe that… The former, it is implied, is the stronger and therefore the better faith. At the level of individual intent, I am not sure that such is the case. But the real issue is a bit of a misunderstanding about the effectiveness of faith.

The efficacy of faith does not depend on its fervor, but on the trustworthiness of its object. It is quite possible to believe passionately in something or someone who is less than worthy of this trust. The results of such misplaced confidence can be quite devastating. On the other hand, a minimum of faith reposed in a trustworthy object or person is always rewarded. This, I believe, is one facet of what Alma meant when he insisted that our experiment with the seed must entail a “good” seed. For if the seed is good, then “a particle” of faith is all that is needed.

Back to Allegory?

When we moderns read any scripture we tend to read it only one way. We read it as history that is supposed to have some sort of theologically edifying meaning to us. This style of reading fits so well with our modes of thinking that it just seems the blatantly obvious way to read scripture. What could be more obvious than reading a book about the past, which we assert is true, as history?

The Case of Peter Enns

Peter Enns is an evangelical scholar of the Old Testament. Until recently he taught at Westminster Theological Seminary. Dr. Enns and the seminary recently reached an agreement for him to step down from his position. Westminster is a conservative theological seminary in the reformed tradition.

Been Sittin’ On My Butt…

The first words of his testimony today were “Been sittin’ on my butt at home for the last six months so I thought I ought to at least give up smoking.” He said he hadn’t been at church during that time like he ought to, “prolly because the fish were biting and the ducks were flying.” And finally he allowed as how, after fifteen or so years, he’d started to feel like he was finally good enough to join the rest of us.

Pretty strong stuff, you know?

Amateur Biblical Studies, Part 2

Here’s the other five resources which I recommend for an amateur in biblical studies just getting started.

Suppressed texts that bounce back

What is it about suppressing an idea that seems to draw attention to it? I’m not sure, but when a text goes from being suppressed to being championed, it perhaps suggests that the ideas it contains are all the more important.

Two cases in point:

Amateur Biblical Studies, Part 1

I am not a biblical scholar, and I have never taken a class in anything related to biblical studies. So, what I am about to say may be worth every penny you are paying. Having said that, I think that it is possible for a motivated amateur to get a basic education in biblical studies on the cheap and in his/her spare time. I wanted to list 10 resource which I have found to be the most helpful and the most effective for getting educated in the world of academic biblical studies. I’ll list the first five resources in this entry, and the second five in the next entry.