This post is from Liz Brocious, a participant in the 2022 Latter-day Saint theology seminar.
Intellectual work requires a certain “mind space” in which one can be immersed in particular texts and ideas. The 2022 LDS Theology Seminar, by carrying us away to New York City and away from the distractions of our regular lives, offered such a space and gave us a rare opportunity to genuinely focus in on the work at hand. But it wasn’t just the fact of being in New York City as such that provided this immersive mind space. The actual day-to-day structures of the seminar were mostly responsible for nurturing it. First, we were all given our own room to work and write. Each morning, we were tasked with engaging creatively, on our own, with a few lines of text, encouraged to draw out connections and meanings that the text itself presented to us. Examining only a few verses on any given day had the effect of really slowing our reading down such that I personally was able to see new ideas, themes, and concepts that I had not seen before. It led me to examine my own assumptions that I brought with me to the text to see if they really stood up to the actual words of the text. I found myself frequently stopping at a word or phrase, closely examining the context that surrounded it, and asking myself, “What actual work is that word (or phrase) doing in the text? Is it really doing what I think it is?” The overall effect was that the text of Enos, one I had read many times in the past such that it was supposedly a familiar one, was defamiliarized to the point that it sometimes felt as if I was coming to it for the first time.
The best intellectual work isn’t ultimately done inisolation, however, but requires conversation partners so that the ideas whichare arrived at in the privacy of our own study can be vetted by others who cometo the text from a different perspective or who have experience with certainconcepts or histories that we might not have. Ultimately, it was theinteraction and conversation with the other participants of the seminar that contributedto my closer examination of the lines of Enos when I was alone each morning inmy own room. I carried with me the comments and contributions of the otherparticipants as I approached the text, and as such was often nudged to see whereI personally had blind spots or misunderstandings. The project of buildingknowledge, such as it is in an academic context especially, is never the resultof an autonomous mind doing its own thing. It is always the case that our ownmind acts as a hub or confluence of various voices and borrowed knowledge-banksand data points. This seminar was an enactment of such a model ofknowledge-building. As such, it was a good reminder for me to operate with astance of epistemological humility.
One other aspect of the seminar that appealed to me is anatural outgrowth of an epistemologically humble stance: we were encouraged towork at the level of hypothesis or provisionality rather than seeing ourselvesas presenting final and sufficient arguments. The premise of hypothesis allowedfor an environment of innovative speculation and creative engagement that feltliberating. It was an opportunity to write daily essays that embody the actualmeaning of essayer, to try. Of course, because we were also operatingwithin the context of adhering closely to the actual words of the text, so thatnot just any reading could be proposed, our “hypotheses” were ultimatelyformulated with intellectual rigor. The provisional premise to the seminar wasa much-appreciated non-dogmatic approach to theology, an approach that, Ibelieve, can contribute in significant ways to genuine theological discoveries.
Aside from the intellectual work of the seminar, the timeswhen we just hung out together or just walked about the city were great funtoo! I very much enjoyed the personal interactions and friendships that theseminar made possible.