Articles

Professor Anthea Butler's MI Guest Lecture is now available to watch online: 'Caught in the Tentacles: American Baptist Home Missions to Mormons in Utah in the Late 19th and Early 20th Century.' Watch https://youtu.be/W0u2IsACJC4In 1898, the Woman’s American Baptist Home Mission Society published a startling tract called “The Mormon Octopus.” The Baptist group warned the nation about a severe danger lurking in the newly-established state of Utah: “Mormonism is an ecclesiastical and, since statehood, a political DESPOTISM. Like a huge octopus, the Mormon hierarchy is fastening its tentacles throughout the Rocky Mountain States, and is sapping the very life-blood of American freedom.” In this Maxwell Institute Guest Lecture, Anthea Butler sheds light on a long-forgotten mission Baptists undertook to rid the nation of this deadly octopus—they took their fight straight to the heart of Utah.P.S.—Coming on Friday, Butler will be featured on the Maxwell Institute Podcast talking about her book, Women in the Church of God in Christ: Making A Sanctified World. About Anthea Butler Anthea Butler is Graduate Chair and Associate Professor of Religious Studies and Africana Studies at the University of Pennsylvania. Professor Butler’s research and writing spans religion and politics, religion and gender, African American religion, sexuality, media, religion, and popular culture. A sought-after media commentator on the BBC, MSNBC, CNN and other media outlets, Professor Butler also provides op-ed on contemporary politics, religion, and race at The New York Times, The Washington Post, and The Guardian. She has also served as a consultant on the PBS series God in America and the American Experience feature about Aimee Semple McPherson. She is the author of Women in the Church of God in Christ: Making A Sanctified World and is currently completing a book on religion, politics, and evangelicals from the U.S. presidential elections of 2008 and 2016. Her website is antheabutler.com.

Cross-posted from faithmatters.org.

The Maxwell Institute has an exciting announcement to make concerning the Nibley Fellowship program this week, so watch this space. In the meantime, enjoy this guest post from Joey Stuart. He's a Nibley Fellowship recipient currently studying at the University of Utah. Here he reflects on how personal vulnerability can help scholars build faith with the help of secular knowledge. When I taught early morning seminary in Richmond, Virginia, I enjoyed using the LDS Church’s Gospel Topics essays to teach aspects of church history and doctrine that many of my students had never encountered. While I used the Gospel Topics essays as my primary text, I also answered questions using my professional training as a historian. My students loved engaging new material and asked excellent questions about race-based priesthood and temple restrictions, plural marriage, women and the priesthood, and many other topics. As a scholar and Latter-day Saint, I savored the experience of sharing my academic expertise in a setting that helped students build faith in Jesus Christ. Teaching seminary was one of the most spiritually and intellectually enriching experiences of my life.It was interesting to me that none of my students ever developed what are sometimes called “faith crises” as a result of my teaching. However, I met with several sets of parents that had questions about history, doctrine, and culture. In one memorable meeting, a mother asked me about the restriction against people of African descent regarding their ordination to the priesthood or participation in temple rituals. I explained the history of the restriction as recovered by scholars in and out of the Church and did not skip any of the painful details. I tried my best to tell her only the facts that I had learned from my years of study about American race and religion so she would not feel that I was trying to excuse past acts. However, I admit part of my teaching “facts” was selfish because it allowed me to separate myself from unsavory events that caused me spiritual pain. I did not have to be vulnerable to share facts; I only had to be informed.She was quiet for a moment, and then suddenly burst out something like this: “People have told me that history before. I am less concerned with knowing how it happened; I want to know what I am supposed to do with the information now. How do you trust the promptings of the Spirit when others felt promptings that in hindsight were so wrong?”This jarring and pointed question taught me a valuable lesson when I spoke with fellow Saints using only secular knowledge. My academic knowledge only mattered in this conversation as much as I was also willing to share my own spiritual experiences, providing both intellectual and devotional frameworks in which others can reconcile faith and knowledge. My expertise only mattered so far as I was willing to speak to my relationship with God and the Church—to be as vulnerable as the person asking me questions. I had to learn to speak about experiences where I had felt the Holy Ghost. I learned that I needed to provide an example of how someone comes to grips with difficult truths and decides to remain planted in the gospel. Remaining aloof and hiding behind rationality does not translate to the difficult task faithful LDS scholars face when they are helping individuals build or regain faith in Christ.I have reflected on this experience many times this year as a Nibley Fellow. I have long admired Dr. Hugh Nibley’s commitment to his faith and to his scholarship—in this he provided all LDS academics an example worthy of emulation. He did not shy away from his identity as a Latter-day Saint nor did he hide his knowledge under a bushel. He helped students and Saints learn from “the best books” and to increase their devotion to the gospel with knowledge obtained through the Spirit and by careful research. Nibley understood that many Saints have benefited from the academic study of religion and history and that rising generations of Mormons will benefit from scholar-disciples’ rigorous study and abiding faith.I am grateful for the generous funding of the Nibley Fellowship Program, which has allowed me to read widely, research in several archives, and prepare articles for submission to academic journals. The Maxwell Institute’s donors have blessed my life by entrusting me with their hard-earned funds—I look forward to the day that I can return the favor and donate to the Nibley Fellowship program.

This year the Maxwell Institute celebrates its tenth anniversary. What a decade it has been! The Institute has published more than a dozen dual-language translations of Islamic, Jewish, and Christian texts. It’s maintained three annual periodicals dedicated to scripture or Mormon studies: Mormon Studies Review, Journal of Book of Mormon Studies, and Studies in the Bible and Antiquity. New book series like “Groundwork: Studies in Theory and Scripture,” “Living Faith,” and “Proceedings of the Mormon Theology Seminar” have raised the bar for Latter-day Saint scholarship. The Maxwell Institute Podcast is reaching thousands of listeners a month.In dozens of publications we’ve sought to deepen understanding and nurture discipleship among Latter-day Saints. Brigham Young University has proven to be a supportive home for the kinds of faithful, rigorous scholarship we strive to produce. We pursue these lofty goals in part to pay tribute to the exemplary life and ministry of Elder Neal A. Maxwell, our revered namesake. We couldn't do what we do without donor partners, subscribers, readers, and listeners—thanks for your support!Here's a sneak peek at a new film we've put together to help people better get to know the work of the Institute:https://youtu.be/JYVH4z_p_VEAnd we’ve only just begun. What comes next?Help us celebrate our tenth anniversary on Saturday, October 29, when Professor David F. Holland of the Harvard Divinity School delivers our annual Neal A. Maxwell Lecture. We’re honored to have him add to a venerable lecture tradition (view past ones here). You won’t want to miss it. (For you out-of-towners we’ll also be filming the proceedings.) In addition to Dr. Holland’s lecture—intriguingly titled “Latter-day Saints and the Problem of Pain”—we’ll also be announcing a new Maxwell Institute Advisory Board that night.Mark your calendars and join us on October 29, at 7:00 p.m, in room 151 of the N. Eldon Tanner Building at BYU. We look forward to seeing you there!Follow us on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and on the MI blog for more updates.

Elder Jeffrey R. HollandYesterday morning, Elder Jeffrey R. Holland of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles spoke at BYU's weekly devotional on being 'Bound by Loving Ties.' His remarks focused on the idea of religion itself, a word which many scholars believe refers to being tied or bound to something, (Latin: religare), like a ligament. ((The full text and video of Elder Jeffrey R. Holland's devotional address 'Religion: 'Bound by Loving Ties'' is available at LDS.org.)) In addition to citing Elder Neal A. Maxwell and friend-of-the-Institute Bruce C. Hafen during his remarks, Elder Holland referred to a number of other interesting sources. For those who want to dig deeper and learn more, I recommend these great resources from the Maxwell Institute.Elder Holland cited Charles Taylor's massive book A Secular Age, which describes a societal shift over the past few centuries 'from a society in which it was virtually impossible not to believe in God, to one in which faith, even for the staunchest believer, is one human possibility among others.' You can learn more about Taylor's work and this historical shift into our secular age in episode 45 of the Maxwell Institute Podcast. BYU's Wheatley Institute's recent summer seminar focused on Taylor's work, too.Elder Holland also spoke of how 'the gloves have come off in the intellectual street fighting' with a group called the New Atheists. 'Figures like Richard Dawkins, Sam Harris, Daniel Dennett, and the late Christopher Hitchens are some of the stars in what is, for me, a dim firmament,' Holland remarked. BYU professor Steven L. Peck directly engages with New Atheist thought in his book Evolving Faith: Wanderings of a Mormon Biologist. One recent reviewer of Peck's book said his 'favorite essay in the book explores the basis for faith in God. Are the New Atheists correct that faith is belief in spite of (or even perhaps because of) a lack of evidence? Peck doesn’t think so.' Elder Holland also dismissed the idea that discoveries such as the age of the earth exceeding 6,000 years must bring our 'religious beliefs tumbling down like a house of cards' like some have predicted. Peck's Evolving Faith carefully confronts older assumptions about the Bible that have been clarified by scientific advances and points to faithful paths forward through new discoveries.If you've never heard of the Pew Research Center it's a good time to become more familiar with it. Elder Holland referred to multiple Pew studies about spirituality and religion in the United States, which Pew specializes in studying. Elizabeth Drescher's recent book, Choosing Our Religion: The Spiritual Lives of America's Nones was sparked in part by Pew's research on the rise of religiously unaffiliated Americans, 'Nones.' She discusses her surprising research in episode 47 of the MIPodcast.Finally, Elder Holland's remarks included a call to recognize and remember the richness of western civilization's religious heritage. He mentioned 'a few of the great religiously-influenced non-LDS pieces of literature' that he read as a BYU student over fifty years ago in order to stress 'how barren our lives would be had there not been the freedom for writers, artists, and musicians to embrace and express religious values or discuss religious issues.' His list included Dante's Divine Comedy and Milton's Paradise Lost, as well as Moby-Dick, The Scarlet Letter, and The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn. He included authors from Tolstoy and Dostoevsky to Emily Dickinson and Flannery O’Connor, religious leaders from Martin Luther to Martin Luther King, Jr. and Pope Francis. Elder Holland expressed gratitude for the powerful religious heritage bequeathed by writers, artists, musicians, architects, prophets, and more: 'Voices of religious faith have elevated our vision, deepened our human conversation, and strengthened both our personal and collective aspiration since time began...So the core landscape of history has been sketched by the pen and brush and words of those who invoke a divine creator’s involvement in our lives and who count on the ligatures of religion to bind up our wounds and help us hold things together.' Elder Holland's words thrilled me because they resonate so well with what I've tried to do with the Maxwell Institute Podcast. The show features top-tier scholars talking about religious faith from a variety of different backgrounds, all in an effort to elevate our vision, deepen our human conversation, and strengthen our aspirations. This is where the best of scholarship aligns so well with the scriptural mandate of Latter-day Saints to 'seek out of the best books words of wisdom; seek learning, even by study and also by faith.' (D&C 88:118). Over fifty episodes are now available for free at mi.byu.edu/mipodcast, on YouTube, and in other podcast outlets like iTunes. I hope they help enrich our understanding of other faiths, as well as our own as Latter-day Saints. I echo Elder Holland's invitation: 'May we think upon the religious heritage that has been handed down to us, at an incalculable price in many instances, and in so remembering not only cherish that heritage more fervently but live the religious principles we say we want to preserve' (emphasis in original). *

BLAIR HODGES: That takes us to the topic of black theology. In your book Down In the Valley you talk little bit about James Cone, who is a prominent theologian, and you also talked a little bit about Jeremiah Wright. People might remember that name from when Barack Obama was campaigning in the 2008 presidential election. Jeremiah Wright was a pastor that had said things about 9/11 and other things that his political opponents fixated on and exploited a little bit. And I thought your book provides some important context for this. Talk for a minute about Jeremiah Wright and what people might learn about him that they’re not going to get in some simplified coverage on CNN or whatever. ((Ironically, I've since discovered a CNN blog post that had some fairly in-depth analysis of Wright's sermon at the time.—BHodges))JULIUS H. BAILEY: Right, yes, yes, so you may remember back to Jeremiah Wright. Obama attended his church. And in part of a sermon he called America to account for some of the issues we talked about earlier, and he said some things prior to talking about America, but people focused on that clip and said, you know, “he’s disparaging America,” or “he’s not totally pro-America!” But it’s really that dynamic we talked about earlier: How can African Americans—who are clearly a part of American history and part of American culture—be patriotic while still calling out America on their promises if they’re still not living up to them, if the American dream doesn’t seem applicable to African Americans?And so Jeremiah Wright during Obama’s campaign made that statement about America. You mentioned black theology going back to James Cone—and some would argue, back to the slave ships and back to West Africa—this idea of black preachers or religious leaders having a really important role in many African American religious communities of asserting for people, to be the voices of those who don’t have a voice. And so, for Jeremiah Wright there’s this sort of black prophetic tradition of calling America out, that you have a religious responsibility if God’s given you this is podium, to not only advocate for yourself, but to advocate for all of your people. And so for Jeremiah Wright it’s to call America out, it’s “why is America not still living up to the promises of the American dream for many African Americans?”And again people were taken aback. And you sort of see that dynamic—you can imagine as you probably remember back, that during a political campaign you don’t necessarily want to be calling America out on their promises to America. And so you see Obama sort of distance himself from that, which you can see why politically would be the case. But you also sort of see that dynamic, and our dynamic now, where people just take a clip from the sermon—they’re not playing the entire sermon, right? They’re just giving you that clip. And so part of what I try to do is to frame that within the context of James Cone and others, of many black Christians who just continue to struggle.James Cone talks about actually thinking about leaving Christianity because it just seemed like he was so disheartened about the way the white churches were dealing with race relations in the 1960s, he just couldn’t see, “how can I be Christian if it doesn’t have any impact on what’s going to happen for African Americans?” or “how do we address these questions?” So black theology is a way of talking about the ways that Jesus can sort of speak to a liberation theology that can be an empowering thing for African Americans, that Christianity and equality, or Christianity empowerment, is not at odds with an African American experience; it actually speaks to that experience.Christianity has that power, but you also need to call America out, or call whatever context you are in, out. That’s what God’s prophets do in the Bible. They call out people if they’re not living up to what God wants them to do, or giving what God wants for the people. And so you sort of see that trajectory. So Jeremiah Wright clearly is part of that. But I think you also see how those dynamics change; that when you have that kind of forum, you have a twenty-four-hour news cycle, you’re also running for president, how that dynamic is really going to shift. And so people say “Oh, wow this is totally out of context,” and part of what I was trying to do in the book is to say, “wow, that is pretty dramatic, but wow look at what black preachers have been doing for centuries!” Like they’ve always been calling white institutions out, or calling America out if he feels like they’re not living up to what God wants for his people in America.

An excerpt from the full transcript of the MIPodcast interview with Lauren F. Winner, now available HERE. Lauren F. WinnerBLAIR HODGES: And there are few images or roles for God that I think are pretty widely held by Christians—things like God as 'father,' God as 'shepherd,' God as a 'physician.'LAUREN WINNER: Right.HODGES: But those are kind of the main ones. I think Christianity, in a way, has kind of stopped at those. Why do you think that is? Why pick a few? Why have we kind of stayed at that level?WINNER: Well, I actually don’t think it’s true that Christianity has stopped at those. I think that different historical moments in the life of the church have paid more or less attention to different images and different biblical passages and biblical metaphors. Part of what I loved in doing the research for this book, in Wearing God, I look particularly at six kind of clusters of figurative language from the scriptures for God. And part of what was fascinating was to see that basically all of these images—even though they aren’t images that we pay very much attention to today—that in earlier moments in church history in some Christian communities these were really central images for speaking about God and speaking to God and speaking about our relationship with God.And so I think it’s interesting that different communities in different times and places in the life of the church will focus in on a handful of images. And maybe that’s just human nature, right? Maybe it’s just entirely predictable that a community will home in on few images, and pray with those and preach about those and write those into their hymnody. And of course when you do that, on the one hand those images become more meaningful. They become meaningful precisely because they are invoked and used all the time.But then there’s a less exciting thing that can happen and that is that the images can become kind of rote, you know, and the person praying with those images can become kind of insensible to them and not really ponder what they mean and just sort of use them almost as placeholders. And then you sort of forget about the mysterious abundance that they’re holding the place for.So all of that was a very long way of saying I think that on the one hand, there’s a richness that comes when you live intimately with a few metaphors or descriptions of God but there’s also a danger. And I think it’s very telling that the scriptures include so very many different metaphors for God. I think part of that very abundance in the scriptures is the constant reminder that we really shouldn’t get too comfortable with any one or two or three of these images because none of them will ever capture, you know, the whole of who God is and we shouldn’t restrict… when the scriptures don’t restrict the scriptural imagination to the images then neither really should we in the church restrict our imaginations to, you know, just father, a great physician, and shepherd. “MIPodcast Moments” are transcribed excerpts of interesting extracts from the MIPodcast for your quick consideration. See our growing list of transcripts HERE.

episode with Julia Watts Belser offers a great primer on Judaism shortly after the destruction of the Temple in 70 CE., answering questions like Who were the rabbis, where did they come from, and what are their writings all about? We focus especially on one particular text, the Bavli Ta’anit, which is a tractate on fasting and disasters. The text has surprising things to say about the relationship between one's outward appearance, righteousness, and God's blessings. Blair Hodges: Let's talk about the part of your book where you’re relating stories about women and men with low status who had the ability to do incredible things that the rabbis were expected to do but couldn't. Talk more about how gender and class are represented in the texts.Julia Watts Belser: Sure. The final chapter of my book examines a series of stories that praise the simple piety of the anonymous, humble, holy man and holy woman. The presence of a couple of women here is actually quite significant in rabbinic Judaism. Because we don’t necessarily always see women emerging in quite this light. But these figures often are revealed to be more virtuous and more pious than some of the greatest of the rabbis. So in one instance, an unknown man averts a plague and spares his neighborhood, not because he’s a great scholar of Torah, not because he’s a master of the law, according to the value system of rabbinic Judaism, but because he lends out his hoe and his shovel to the local cemetery. A woman protects her neighbors from a blaze of fire because she shares her oven with her neighbors. It’s a concrete act of communal protection that trumps the efforts of the great sage Rav Huna. In another story, Rava, one of the greatest rabbis of the late Babylonian academy, is utterly crestfallen when he learns that God sends a daily personal missive to the otherwise unknown guy, Abba the Bloodletter. A bloodletter is a healer, he’s a medical practitioner but, let’s be clear, he is not at the top of rabbinic social hierarchy.Hodges: Not a prestigious…bloodletting…not a very prestigious .Belser: Exactly. I mean, he has some prestige, but certainly if the rabbis were doing a sort of ordinary ranking of merits they would place themselves far higher in answer to the question, 'ideally, who’s got favor with God?' Ha, clearly it’s the rabbis! So Abba the Bloodletter gets his correspondence from God on a daily basis and Rava, it turns out, only gets personal connection with God once a year. So Rava is quite distraught about this and he sends out his rabbi minions to discover what Abba’s secret is, and also probably to try and reveal that he’s not actually worthy of divine favor after all. But Rava’s ruse backfires. Despite the rabbi’s terrible behavior, Abba The Bloodletter reveals himself to be a humble, virtuous, pious man. Hospitable, careful, generous, right? And the reader is left to conclude he is in fact, actually far more worthy than the two hapless rabbis in the tale or the illustrious leader of the Babylonian rabbinic academy who sent those other rabbis on the first place.So, in thinking about these type of stories, I appeal to the work of the great historian of late antiquity Peter Brown. He’s talked about this type of tale as a story that dramatizes what he calls “paradoxes of sanctity.” He’s particularly focused on late antique Christian texts, so he emphasizes this type of storytelling appears quite often in Syriac—that is, eastern Christian—sources from around the same time and a relatively similar geographical area. These tales, I think, underscore the idea that holiness and divine favor don’t correlate neatly with social status or with any other external signs or marks of a person’s virtue. In the rabbinic texts, they serve as a powerful and somewhat unsettling reminder that the usual markings of high class—good status, masculinity, learning, elite family background—don’t actually testify to a person’s piety or their character.These teachings are part and parcel of what I see as one of the Bavli Ta’anit's central theological and ethical claims: You can’t actually judge by looking. You can’t make a clear and convincing link between social status and divine favor. Those external signs of success—prosperity and acclaim, right—they don’t actually reveal the inner dimensions of the heart. They don’t tell us much—maybe anything—about the nature of a person’s piety, or the truth of their connection with God.Hodges: So that raises the question, if that’s the case on the individual level—where you can’t tell based on how righteous a person is based on how prosperous they are—how does that correlation play out in that wider covenant narrative that we talked about from Deuteronomy, where God promises rain and abundance when the community is righteous?Belser: I think you’ve just identified the crux of one of the most important—and potentially subversive, right?—dimensions on what’s going on in Bavli Ta’anit. In the biblical book of Deuteronomy we see this very clear notion of covenantal ecology. It’s a claim that God’s favor and God’s rain come in response to good behavior. But Bavli Ta’anit complicates this idea. It doesn’t entirely disown it, but it certainly messes up the neat and tidy assessment that we saw in Deuteronomy. Where Deuteronomy has a strict notion that obedience to God will get you a favorable weather forecast, Bavli Ta’anit is just not so sure.In Bavli Ta’anit we see the idea that virtue and piety might be rewarded. But that “might” is a critical difference than the confidence we saw in Deuteronomy. It might be rewarded. But Bavli Ta’anit also knows that sometimes there is a real disconnect between right action and reward. So I see this as a very theologically significant idea. It’s the recognition that signs of divine favor are not so easy to read after all. The healthy, wealthy, meteorologically well off—these aren’t necessarily the ones who have God’s blessing.And on the communal level as well we see this, too. If you think about the context of Jewish communities in late antiquity where a lot of Jewish history can be told as a series of one disaster after the next you can see how this might be an interesting, important, meaningful, resonant theology, right?—that the external circumstances of a community don’t actually testify, in a conclusive way, to its connection to God.

Today is Good Friday, when many Christians throughout the world commemorate the suffering and death of Jesus Christ. The New Testament records seven phrases Jesus uttered as he hung on the cross and these 'seven last words' form a central part of Good Friday worship services for Catholics. Jesuit priest James Martin discusses each phrase in his book Seven Last Words: An Invitation to a Deeper Friendship with Jesus. Martin recently talked about his book on the Maxwell Institute Podcast. You might enjoy listening today in preparation for Easter, but if you don't have time to spare here's an excerpt from the interview. ConversationBLAIR HODGES: if there was an overarching theme in Jesus's sayings it's the way that Jesus's sufferings help him to understand us. That became, I think, the keystone of your book that you revisit time and again.is Son of God. And we tend to forget that he was a human being, that he would have gotten sick, you know, he may have sprained an ankle or two, he got headaches, he got tired. He had a body, basically. And more to the point, he grew up in Nazareth. He worked for eighteen years from ages twelve to thirty. I mean he worked, he didn't just sit on his rear end and do nothing and wait for the baptism. He was in a carpenter worship. And that's hard work. We tend to think of it as kind of romantic, you know, he has all of his Sears Craftsman tools you know up on a pegboard somewhere, but you know, he did hard work. The time on the cross really does show us his humanity. He is suffering physically, and I suggest in the book that he's suffering emotionally, too. I mean he's abandoned by his disciples. And he even suffers spiritually. He says 'my God, my God, why have you abandoned me?' He feels this distance from the Father. So, what's the point? The point is that when we pray to someone, when we pray to Jesus, we're not praying to someone who doesn't understand us. We're not praying to someone who is far removed from us. We're praying to someone who understand us, not simply because he's God and he understands all things, but because he's a human being and he experienced all these things. He remembers these things. Remember, when he comes back from the resurrection he's bearing the wounds—BH: Right—JM: So, it is that kind of connection to the human Jesus that I find really helpful for me.BH: So if you'll indulge me, there's a really interesting passage in the Book of Mormon that touches on this. It's in a book called Alma (7:11–12) and it hits on this. It says Jesus 'shall go forth'—this is a prophet sort of foretelling the mission of Christ—'And he shall go forth, suffering pains and afflictions and temptations of every kind; and this that the word might be fulfilled which saith he will take upon him the pains and the sicknesses of his people. And he will take upon him death, that he may loose the bands of death which bind his people...' And this is the part that always sticks out to me— 'and will take upon him their infirmities, that his bowels may be filled with mercy, according to the flesh, that he may know according to the flesh how to succor his people according to their infirmities.'JM: That's beautiful. That's beautiful, you know I don't know much about Mormonism, but I agree a hundred percent with what you just read. You know it's interesting, you used the word 'bowels,' you probably know in the Greek world and in the New Testament when we hear the term 'Jesus's heart was moved with pity,' it's his bowels. And so there's a sense that he feels it kind of in his guts—BH: Yeah, deep down—JM: So yeah, and he does take on—it's a really beautiful passage—he does take on our infirmities. Now you can see that in the spiritual way, sort of that, you know, he kind of enters into the world with all of its sinfulness. But in a very homey way, and I say this sometimes to shock people, he got sick!BH: Yeah—JM: He had the flu, he had stomachaches, and then more severely at the crucifixion he suffered intense physical pain. So you know, when people who are struggling or sick, when they pray, I remind them that Jesus understands this, as you say, he took on our infirmities. And so it connects people more with Jesus.

For those who don't have time to listen to hour-long episodes of the Maxwell Institute Podcast I'm posting interesting moments for you to read. This excerpt comes courtesy of Lauren F. Winner, author of Wearing God: Clothing, Laughter, Fire, and Other Overlooked Ways of Meeting God. This quote is from MIPodcast episode 27. 'Unto Adam also and to his wife did the Lord God make coats of skins, and clothed them.' (Genesis 3:21)

In episode 36 of The Mormon Book Review, Matthew Godfrey joins Kirk Caudle to discuss The Joseph Smith Papers, Documents Volume 2, July 1831–January 1833. Godfrey details the early establishment of the city of Zion and letters that Joseph Smith sent to wife Emma. He reflects on the personal side of the prophet and provides his own opinion on Smith’s early leadership style. Godfrey also provides a brief update on the upcoming publication of the Council of Fifty minutes.Matthew C. Godfrey is managing historian of The Joseph Smith Papers and co-editor of volumes in the Documents series. He holds a PhD in American and public history from Washington State University. Before joining the project, he worked for eight years at Historical Research Associates, a historical and archaeological consulting firm headquartered in Missoula, Montana, serving as president of the company from 2008 to 2010. He is the author of Religion, Politics, and Sugar: The Mormon Church, the Federal Government, and the Utah-Idaho Sugar Company, 1907-1921, which was a co-winner of the Mormon History Association’s Smith-Pettit Award for Best First Book. He has also published articles in Agricultural History and Pacific Northwest Quarterly and has presented papers at conferences of the Mormon History Association, the National Council on Public History, the American Society for Environmental History, and the Western History Association, among other organizations.To listen to this episode, 'Matthew Godfrey on Joseph Smith Papers, Documents, Volume 2, July 1831–January 1833,' right click here and select 'Save as.'You can subscribe to the Maxwell Institute Podcast through iTunes. Help our podcast grow by rating and reviewing it there. The podcatcher RSS feed is mi.byu.edu/feed/podcast. Send questions or comments about this and other episodes to blairhodges@byu.edu.

In episode 35 of the Mormon Book Review, Kirk Caudle discusses The Joseph Smith Papers: Documents, Volume 1, July 1828-1831, with the book's coeditor Gerrit Dirkmaat. In this interview Dirkmaat talks about the earliest revelations of Joseph Smith and provides key historical background information concerning Doctrine and Covenants sections 19, 25, and 41.Gerrit Dirkmaat is a historian working as an editor of The Joseph Smith Papers volumes. He received his PhD in 2010 from the University of Colorado, Boulder, where he studied nineteenth-century American expansionism and foreign relations. His dissertation was titled “Enemies Foreign and Domestic: US Relations with Mormons in the US Empire in North America, 1844–1854.” He served as the senior assistant editor of Diplomatic History from 2003 to 2009. He joined the Joseph Smith Papers project in 2010 and has since served as a historian/editor on Journals Vol. 2, Documents Vol. 1, and as the lead volume editor of Documents Vol. 3, which will be published in 2014. He is currently serving as an editor for the first volume in the Administrative series. He is the coauthor, along with Michael Hubbard MacKay, of the forthcoming book from the Maxwell Institute Press, tentatively titled Joseph the Seer: The Translation and Publication of the Book of Mormon.To listen to this episode, 'Gerrit Dirkmaat on Joseph Smith Papers, Documents, Volume 1, July 1828-1831,' right click here and select 'Save as.'You can subscribe to the Maxwell Institute Podcast through iTunes. The podcatcher RSS feed is mi.byu.edu/feed/podcast. Send questions or comments about this and other episodes to blairhodges@byu.edu.

In episode 34 of the Mormon Book Review, Kirk Caudle discusses the book Revelation, Resistance, and Mormon Polygamy: The Introduction and Implementation of the Principle, 1830–1853 with author Merina Smith. Smith situates Joseph Smith's conception of marriage within wider 19th-century views of Christian marriage and explores some differences between Nauvoo polygamy and Utah polygamy.Merina Smith graduated from the University of Colorado, raised five children, and then returned to graduate school to earn a PhD from the University of California at San Diego in 2011. She currently researches and writes as an independent historian. She resides in San Diego with her husband, legal scholar Steven Smith.To listen to this episode, 'Merina Smith, Revelation, Resistance, and Mormon Polygamy,” right click here and select “Save as.”You can subscribe to the Maxwell Institute Podcast through iTunes. The podcatcher RSS feed is mi.byu.edu/feed/podcast. Send questions or comments about this and other episodes to blairhodges@byu.edu.

In episode 33 of The Mormon Book Review, Kirk Caudle discusses New Perspectives in Mormon Studies: Creating and Crossing Boundaries with the book's coeditor, Quincy D. Newell. Newell discusses the genesis of this collection of essays, definitions of 'Mormon studies,' how she became involved in Mormon studies, and what non-Mormon scholars add to the conversation. Newell's own work has focused largely on the experiences of nineteenth-century nonwhite Mormons, so she also reflects on the significance of Jane James in Mormon history.

Episode 32 of The Mormon Book Review features Latter-day Saint author and evolutionary ecologist Steven Peck speaking about his existentialist horror novella A Short Stay in Hell. Kirk Caudle explores Peck's thoughts on exploring other faith traditions, how to find religious truth through fictional literature, and the dizzying vastness of eternity.Peck is an evolutionary ecologist who teaches history, philosophy of science, and bioethics at Brigham Young University. He has published articles in American Naturalist, Newsweek, Evolution, Trends in Ecology and Evolution, Biological Theory, Agriculture and Human Values, and Biology & Philosophy, and has also edited a volume on environmental stewardship. His other books and short stories include The Scholar of Moab (Torrey House Press) and a young adult novel about warrior squirrels called Rifts of Ryme (Cedar Fort Press). Earlier this week, Peck announced that A Short Stay in Hell has been picked up by indie film director David Spaltro for a film adaptation (see here).*The audio quality for this episode is poor. You can download this episode by right clicking here and selecting 'Save as.'You can subscribe to the Maxwell Institute Podcast through iTunes. The podcatcher RSS feed is mi.byu.edu/feed/podcast. Send questions or comments about this and other episodes to blairhodges@byu.edu.

Episode 31 of The Mormon Book Review focuses on a new classic in Mormon history—Joseph Smith: Rough Stone Rolling (New York: Vintage Books, 2005). Host Kirk Caudle talks with author Richard L. Bushman about the continuing relevance of the book, the religious world of Joseph Smith, and nineteenth-century Christian expectations for the second coming of Jesus Christ.Richard Bushman is a Gouverneur Morris Professor of History emeritus at Columbia University. He served as the Howard W. Hunter chair of Mormon Studies at Claremont Graduate University from 2008–2011. He was co-general editor of the Joseph Smith Papers until 2012. He currently chairs the board of directors for the Mormon Scholars Foundation, and with his wife Claudia, is the Church history adviser for the North American North East Area. He is the author of many books including: Joseph Smith and the Beginnings of Mormonism (University of Illinois, 1984), Building the Kingdom: A History of Mormons in America (Oxford, 2001), and Mormonism: A Very Short Introduction (Oxford, 2008)To listen to this episode, 'Richard Bushman revisits Joseph Smith: Rough Stone Rolling,' right click here and select 'Save as.'You can subscribe to the Maxwell Institute Podcast through iTunes. The podcatcher RSS feed is mi.byu.edu/feed/podcast. Send questions or comments about this and other episodes to blairhodges@byu.edu.

Episode 30 of The Mormon Book Review focuses on the book Make it Happen: A Guide to Happiness for LDS Singles (Salt Lake City: Walnut Springs Press, 2012). Host Kirk Caudle talks with author Kylee Shield about sexuality, frustrations related to marital expectations, and how 30-something single Mormons find happiness.Kylee Shields grew up in Oregon and currently resides in Arizona. She received a BA in English (creative writing/editing) with a minor in linguistics from Brigham Young University. At Arizona State University she earned a master's degree in social work (emphasis in clinical therapy). Shields currently works as a 'shadow' (family therapist) at The Anasazi Foundation, where she does therapy with adolescents from the deserts of Arizona. She also co-founded a musical fireside group that is in the process of becoming a nonprofit. She loves writing, poetry, reading great novels, and blogging. She adores her old typewriter on which she composes letters now and again, sealed with wax. She also loves to travel and has been to Egypt, Ghana, Italy, Mexico, Canada, Ireland, Scotland, and almost all fifty of the states. To listen to this episode, 'Kylee Shields on Make it Happen: A Guide to Happiness for LDS Singles,” right click here and select “Save as.”You can subscribe to the Maxwell Institute Podcast through iTunes. Help our podcast grow by rating and reviewing it there. The podcatcher RSS feed is mi.byu.edu/feed/podcast. Send questions or comments about this and other episodes to blairhodges@byu.edu.

Episode 29 of The Mormon Book Review focuses on the new book Mormon Women Have Their Say: Essays from the Claremont Oral History Collection (Greg Kofford Books, 2013). In this interview, host Kirk Caudle talks with editor Caroline Kline and contributor Elizabeth Mott about feminism, women's studies, working mothers, gender roles, and perspectives on how the LDS Church benefits women.Caroline Kline obtained a BA from Scripps College in classical languages, an MA in classics from UC Santa Barbara, and is currently finishing coursework for a PhD in religion at Claremont Graduate University. Her academic areas of interest include feminist Mormon communities, the intersections between Mormon and feminist theology, and women in American religion. She is the cofounder of the Mormon feminist blog, The Exponent, and is a board member of LDS WAVE (Women Advocating for Voice and Equality). Her publications include “From Here to Eternity: Women’s Bodies, Women’s Destinies in the Theology of Janice Allred” in the journal Element, and “The Mormon Conception of Women’s Nature: A Feminist Analysis,” forthcoming in the Journal of Feminist Theology (Britain and Ireland). When she has completed her doctorate, Caroline hopes to teach at a college or university. She is the mother of three small children.Elizabeth Mott is completing coursework for a PhD in religion with a focus on American religious history at Claremont Graduate University. She received a master’s degree in mass communications from Brigham Young University before moving to Claremont to study religion. Her interests include the role of communications in religious change, gender, theology, and lived religion.Audio quality is poor in this episode. To listen to 'Caroline Kline and Elizabeth Mott, Mormon Women Have Their Say,” right click here and select “Save as.”You can subscribe to the Maxwell Institute Podcast through iTunes. Help our podcast grow by rating and reviewing it there. The podcatcher RSS feed is mi.byu.edu/feed/podcast. Send questions or comments about this and other episodes to blairhodges@byu.edu.