The Gift of Tongues: The Propagation of Sermon Texts in Mormonism

Another blast from the past. It seemed appropriate.

In spite of all the talk about remembering what we feel in a sermon experience, not what we hear, as valid as that may be, it is the text that reigns supreme. Recreating a sermon is not possible. But recording the words spoken on the occasion may be valuable. From the very beginning of Joseph Smith’s career, it was the text that trumped all other things. The Book of Mormon saga places the text in the role of savior, preserver and founder of language and true religion. It was to be expected that Mormons would keep records, and by commandment.

“Outlines of Mormon Philosophy” and the King Follett Discourse

Lycurgus Arnold Wilson was born in Salem, Utah in 1856.[1] Wilson did a stint as a school teacher in Utah valley and then decided on the Law as profession, eventually founding the firm, Booth and Wilson. In 1891, Wilson became tithing clerk for Presiding Bishop William B. Preston.[2]

Publication Note: Descriptive Bibliography of the Mormon Church Volume 3.

The BYU Religious Studies Center has published the third volume in Peter Crawley’s A Descriptive Bibliography of the Mormon Church.

This volume covers the period from 1853-1857 and is the final volume in the series. The book covers those materials printed with one or more pages that bear on some Church matter. Articles in newspapers, maps, prints, banknotes and ephemeral pieces are not included.

These volumes are the most important contributions to early LDS print culture and will remain so for the foreseeable future.

Available at

Amazon:

$54.84 (free shipping).
ISBN: 978-0-8425-2810-8

Construction, dust jacket and size match the previous two volumes. Essentially for anyone interested in early Mormon imprints or Mormon history from 1830-1857.

Faith Alone

Recently I saw this contribution to the book Bountiful Harvest: Essays in Honor of S. Kent Brown (Provo, 2012). Brown’s career is full of careful if understated scholarship on religion and the Ancient Near East. This book is well-deserved and a fine addition to any library. One particular contribution to the collection is by Kevin L. Barney, titled “‘Faith Alone’ in Romans 3:28 JST.” You can read this online here. I recommend a read for an illuminating excursion through some of the issues surrounding the post title.

Jonathan Edwards Center Announces New Sermon Initiative. You Become the Editor.

YALE DIVINITY SCHOOL News Release

New Volume of Jonathan Edwards Sermons

The Jonathan Edwards Center at Yale notes that Wipf and Stock has published a new volume of Edwards sermons:

Sermons by Jonathan Edwards on the Matthean Parables, Volume 1. Edited by Ken Minkema, Adriaan C. Neele and Bryan McCarthy.

Stemmata for the Funeral Sermons of Joseph Smith

Here’s an example for one of the funeral sermons.

Preaching event at the top. Arrows represent text dependence.

This particular sermon was published in full a comparatively large number of times. The more times in print the more complicated the variorum. In this particular case, one excerpt has appeared (just in recent years) over a hundred times in Church conferences and literature. That is rather unusual and somewhat odd, given the earth shaking stuff you *could* come up with. The stemma reveals the most influential editor: MS2. It is not always easy to identify the real editor of published Church documents and in the typesetting era often more than one set of hands dealt with a given text like this one. Complete texts of Joseph Smith’s sermons tend to be published by the Church at large during in a cycle very similar to this one. Aside from reprinting certain standard imprints like Teachings of the Prophet Joseph Smith, and a few independently published versions of the sermons, new “official” imprints stopped after 1952.

“Neo — Anything That Has A Beginning Will Have An Ending” — Mr. Smith

While browsing the Millennial Star I came across this thing from an amateur missionary-philosopher. This is 1882 and shows how far theological drift had come from Joseph Smith among the rank and file. I think you might have heard parts of this in a mid-20th century general conference address. It demonstrates a bit of “lived theology” if you will. Anyway, I liked it for that and some other reasons — see the title. Enjoy.

Man is a noble being; created in the image of his Maker, endowed with faculties divine, eternal. He is born to live for ever. Not limited with his present knowledge, not shackled by surrounding circumstances, not bound to earth by the laws that govern inanimate matter.

Preaching, Rhetoric and Mormons

[Cross posted at BCC.]

With the recent conference, many Church members saw what has become the pinnacle of Mormon Preaching: The General Conference Address. But is it really representative of the Mormon sermon? I say no. In my paltry experience, Mormon preaching is much more like classical Methodist homily than the considered rationalist stuff you might get from an Anglican pulpit. General Conference preaching is very carefully scripted. No off the reservation speculation, no fire and brimstone to speak of, no getting lost in the rhetorical moment allowed, much. (I think Church presidents have their leeway and there is descent evidence for that.)

Sermons, More Sermons and Funeral Sermons

Sermons in antebellum America were both innovative and derivative. While disestablishment opened wider the doors of American Religious Culture to the radical, it also strengthened the radical establishment (by that I mean the unsettled Methodists and Baptists). Preachers naturally came in similar breadth and hence their sermons found all sorts of niches in which to settle.

We are dependent on the egos or concerns of the preachers themselves (for the most part) to see what they preached and where and when they did it.

The Dividing Line. What of “Gospel Scholarship?”

Preaching in 18th century New England tended to fall out in two ways. Here’s one example:

Contention! “You might as well argue with the wind.”

The balance between the rational and the intuitive (in Mormonism we might say, reason vs. revelation, or the “mantle” vs. the “intellect”) — it’s not a new discussion. Roughly 300 years ago New England pulpits rang with polemics, preacher against preacher, over things like itinerancy, extemporaneous sermons, lay testimony and emotional conversion experiences. Each might be seen as either the work of the Devil or the work of God. Clerical conferences, used to a few quiet conversations over theological points, were torn asunder by bitter conflicts between extremes. The enlightened vs. the pious.

“Apply the subject to the cases of such as are convinced of the truth of Christianity but do not heartily embrace it, and openly espouse its cause”

Within the little village of Palmyra, New York, at the corner of Main Street and Canandaigua Road stand four churches.

Preaching Manuals, The Eighteenth Century, Jonathan Edwards and Joseph Smith

The Sermon Culture of the America prior to Joseph Smith’s advent was dominated by several important figures. Certainly the most well known of the 18th century was Jonathan Edwards. While Joseph Smith rarely penned much of anything, and never wrote down a sermon, he had stock topics that he returned to with some frequency.

The Mormon Naturalist

[Cross posted at BCC.]

No this isn’t a post about Steve Peck, much as I think that would be fun. Instead, its in the vein I’ve been sort of mining lately. I hesitate to use the tired “Mormonism and Science” title, but what the heck. Why not?