During an episode of the popular British Sci-Fi show, Doctor Who, the titular character confronts a woman who has engaged in a series of witch hunts in seventeenth century Britain. The witch hunter explains her view that she is required…
Are We Going to Be Able to Buy the Kirtland Temple?
I’ve always been fascinated with sacred real estate disputes, and we certainly have our own. The most salient–the American “Temple Mount”–is probably the Temple Lot in Independence, the story of which makes for fascinating reading: a geographically precise, small plot…
Waiting For Saints 3
Three years ago this month, Saints, Volume 1: The Standard of Truth, 1815-1846 was published. Saints, Volume 2: No Unhallowed Hand, 1846-1893 followed about a year-and-a-half later in February 2020. If later volumes had followed the same cadence for releases,…
Terryl Givens on Eugene England
In general, the people who are in a position to be most influential in the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints have been official Church leaders. That’s not always the case, however, since there are a number of members…
A plea for opacity
It’s the ecclesiology, stupid.
“The constitution of this Land”
The attitude of Latter-day Saints towards the United States government has historically been paradoxical. As Dale Morgan wrote: “The Mormons had a profound respect for government and governmental forms, but disrespect for and outright distrust of ‘the damned rascals who…
“Concerning the building of mine house”
The temples of the early Latter Day Saint movement were a place where several strands of Joseph Smith’s theology and doctrine were braided together. In the summer of 1833 (in the revelations we are studying this week for “Come, Follow…
The hundred billion dollar question
The stakes in the 2024 election couldn’t be higher.
Archeology, Ceramics, and the Smith Family in Tunbridge
In addition to written records, people leave behind traces of their material lives that can tell us much about who they were. In a recent interview with Kurt Manwaring, Mark Staker (a Master Curator for the Church History Department’s Historic…
“That you may understand and know”
“The world is changed. … Much that once was is lost, for none now live who remember it. … And some things that should not have been forgotten were lost. History became legend. Legend became myth. And for two and…
Ruf aus der Wüste 6: Appendix
Orson Hyde asks people to read his book. Or else.
“A word of wisdom for the benefit of the Saints”
One of the paradoxes about the Word of Wisdom is that the name (drawn from the opening line of the text from the 27 February 1833 revelation) indicates that it is good advice while it’s treated as a commandment in…
Is the Church Replacing Itself in the United States? Population Momentum and its Capacity to Hide Decline
The following is Stephen Cranny’s fourth guest post here at Times & Seasons. Stephen Cranney is a Washington DC-based data scientist and Non-Resident Fellow at Baylor’s Institute for the Studies of Religion. He has produced over 20 peer-reviewed articles and…
Historical Mindset for Mormons, 101
While studying in a scientific field, two major ideas were drilled into me that have been fairly helpful in interpreting history. First is the belief that nothing can ever truly be proved, only that things can be disproved. If something…
“This is the light of Christ“
As one of Joseph Smith’s largest revelations, Doctrine and Covenants, Section 88 (or, as Joseph Smith called it, “the Olieve leaf which we have plucked from the tree of Paradise”) has a lot of different talking points. As historian Richard…
Ruf aus der Wüste 5.5: Hyde’s police report
Orson Hyde might be protesting too much here.
So You Want to Talk About Polygamy?
I’ve long had an interest in understanding how and why my ancestors chose to practice polygamy. During my time at Utah State University, I spent most of my spare time reading Mormon Studies materials and went on a polygamy binge…
Joseph F. Merrill—Science, Religion, and Innovation
Joseph F. Merrill is an apostle who has largely been forgotten but who, nevertheless, left a major impact on the Church that remains a part of its DNA to this day. Kurt Manwaring recently sat down for an interview with…
“These two Priesthoods”
Words can be a bit slippery, particularly when we use them in different ways over time. Take, for example, the use of the word “ordinance” in the Church. In its most basic sense, an ordinance is an authoritative order; a…
Ruf aus der Wüste 5.4: Hyde on Illinois
For Hyde, Zion has been displaced, but not deferred.
Mr. Smith Goes to Washington
Joseph Smith’s presidential campaign has been an area of interest for several years now (particularly since the release of the Council of Fifty minutes), and Spencer W. McBride’s recently-published Joseph Smith for President: The Prophet, the Assassins, and the Fight…
“This is Elias”
In both the Vision studied recently (D&C 76) and the first revelation studied this week (D&C 77) there is a mysterious figure referenced as Elias. Throughout the remainder of his ministry, Joseph Smith would use this name-title to refer to…
Paid clergy isn’t priestcraft
But I’m still glad we don’t have one.
A Scriptural Prank
One day while I was serving my mission, my companion told me that he knew the name of the Holy Ghost. I told him I was doubtful, but he insisted that it was Eden. He opened his scriptures to Doctrine…
“Bodies Terestrial and not bodies Celestial”
As I was working on my previous post, I had a thought I wanted to explore, but not enough space there: If we believe in eternal progression but also want to argue that there are limits to upward mobility in…
“They cannot come worlds without end”
One of the methods that paleontologists use to understand the age of a fossil in relation to other fossils at a site is by looking at layers, or strata. The basic idea is that layers build up over time, with…
Ruf aus der Wüste 5.3: Hyde on Missouri
The experience of persecution in Missouri was not just recent history. For Hyde, it was the literal fulfillment of prophecy about the last days.
Lit Come Follow Me: D&C 76: The Vision
Poetry for this week’s Come Follow Me lesson, D&C section 76, The Vision of the Celestial Kingdom — plus, was Joseph Smith a poet?
“Exhortation to the churches”
It can be easy at times, when studying the early history of the Church through the lens of the Doctrine and Covenants, to forget that there was a whole life and existence in the Church outside of the main gathering…
A Whole Lot of Hugh Nibley
Some years ago, I attended a course on the Pearl of Great Price at the Logan Institute that could have just as easily been entitled “Teachings of Hugh Nibley.” The teacher was well-versed in Nibley’s writings and frequently used them…