Here’s some more of my prospectus that deals with the issues of pre-Reformation survivals. Some of this I’ve posted around here already but I contextualize it here a little differently. (more…)

Ann Taves, my adviser, signed off on me sending this out to my committee a few days ago. The whole things is over 30 pages so I just include the first part here. (more…)

Like much of Joseph Smith’s thought, his understanding of the priesthood did not emerge all at once in 1820 (or, for that matter, in 1829). As Greg Prince has shown, the earliest Mormons did not think in terms of “priesthood” like later Latter-day Saints would understand it–as a broad umbrella term that included multiple offices. This understanding did not come about until 1835, with D&C 107 (see WVS’s fantastic series on D&C 107, especially part 6). Instead, they thought of offices with varying responsibilities and duties. The early church (1829-1830) included the offices of elders, priests, and teachers, with bishops, high priests, and deacons being added in 1831. However, Prince also suggests that the Book of Mormon and documents from 1829-1830 indicate that early Mormons understood an implied distinction between the authority of elders and the authority of priests and teachers (Power from on High, 12, 27; contrast Quinn, Origins of Power, 289n137, who does not accept this early, implied division). (more…)

In Robert Bartlett’s The Natural and the Supernatural in the Middle Ages (2008), he pauses to wonder how historians deal with beliefs our subjects hold but “we” don’t. (more…)

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Despite being a member of the first Quorum of the Twelve, to most members of the church today William E. McLellin, if he’s known at all, is associated primarily with D&C 67. The revelation was received at the November 1831 conference, where the publication of Joseph Smith’s revelations was discussed in detail. (more…)

Image from Confetti Antiques and Books-confettiantiques.com

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Ezra Booth, a former Methodist minister, he converted to Mormonism in 1831 after witnessing a miraculous healing performed by Joseph Smith. Booth initially found the Mormon message very compelling, especially the promise of spiritual gifts and the imminent establishment of the New Jerusalem. But as months passed, Booth found the gap between expectation and result to widen, as in his mind the spiritual gifts did not come in the manner he hoped and the site of the New Jerusalem in Missouri (see D&C 57) was not the land of milk and honey he envisioned (as described in D&C 38:18). He also didn’t like the June 1831 (D&C 52) commandment to walk to Missouri for the dedication of the temple site, or the August 1831 commandment to walk back to Ohio (D&C 60), preaching along the way (at 800 miles one way, I wonder how many people actually liked the thought of that), and he became increasingly critical of JS and other Mormon leaders. In early September, the church conference silenced Booth from preaching, and over the next few months he published a series of letters in the local newspaper, the Ohio Star. (more…)

[Note: The following is a book review forthcoming in Dialogue: A Journal of Mormon Thought. I appreciate Kristine Haglund and Russell Fox for allowing me to reproduce it here.]

Aird, Polly. Mormon Convert, Mormon Defector: A Scottish Immigrant in the American West, 1848-1861. (Norman, Okl.: Arthur H. Clark Company, 2009). 320 pp. Illustrations, photos, maps, footnotes, bibliography, index. Cloth: $39.95, ISBN 978-0-87062-369-1.

Just as national histories are always written by the victors, religious narratives are often written by those who remain within the fold. The common tropes of conversion, devotion, dedication through trials, and faithfulness until death dominate Mormon historiography. What are missing are those whose stories diverge from the traditional storylines. In Mormon Convert, Mormon Defector: A Scottish Immigrant in the American West, 1848-1861, Polly Aird provides us with an account of someone whose narrative significantly differed from the norm. Peter McAuslan embraced the Mormon faith in his native Scotland, made the arduous trek to Utah to live with the body of Saints, grew disillusioned with the faith he once loved, and then decided to leave the Church, flee Deseret, and establish a new life once more in California. While stories like McAuslan’s are often quickly forgotten, they are crucial to enriching our understanding of the historical period, offering a-traditional views in order to complete our portrait of the past. (more…)

Mormon Historical Studies 11:1 (Spring 2010) (more…)

Historical fundamentalism has been a hot topic as of late. Partly as a reaction to movements like the Tea Party, partly as a continuation of the frustrating distance between mainstream and academic history, and partly in response to the growth of constitutional originalism in public discourse as an opposition to societal and political changes—all three parts, it should be noted, are unmistakably interconnected—there has been an increase of ruminations concerning the relationship between the past and the present. (See here, here, here, and here, for example. Also, and especially, here, and here) A recent and significant contribution to these debates comes from Harvard historian Jill Lepore, whose The Whites of their Eyes: The Tea Party’s Revolution and the Battle over American History is a captivating account of how people use (and abuse) the past for modern causes, collapsing the distance between then and now in an effort to gain political and intellectual validation. (A great overview of the book, as well as an insightful interview with Lepore, can be found here. For an enlightening previous interview with Lepore on the importance of being a “public historian,” sees here.)[1] Personally, I’ve been looking forward to the book for months. (more…)