By Ben PJuly 14, 2008
Well, it depends on who you ask. As discussed before (see esp. comments 9-12, 25-29), the argument over what was rational and what was absurd was a hot topic in Antebellum America, especially when attempting to describe and understand new religious movements. What many felt was completely asinine, others found fulfilling. This led to confusion on both sides while they tried to grapple with the other’s beliefs. Here, for example, is an editorial written in Europe in 1843 attempting to explain this new Mormon movement stealing away many of their citizens.
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By Ben PJuly 2, 2008
Literary scholar Lawrence Buell, in his excellent New England Literary Culture, explored one of the most important ideas related to the antebellum Romantic thinkers–an idea that he defines as “literary scripturism.”
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By Ben PJune 3, 2008
Just in case you didnt get enough on Emerson back in February (see here and here), this is an encore performance.
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By Ben PMay 28, 2008
One of the great things about blogging is the ability to bounce ideas off people much smarter than yourself. Therefore, I want to just throw one of my thoughts out and hope that an engaging discussion on the topic will follow.
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By Ben PMay 11, 2008
I spent way too much time on Saturday going through the Virginia Sorensen papers collection in BYU’s Special Collections.
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By Ben PApril 30, 2008
The following was printed in Times and Seasons, September 1, 1842.
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By Ben PApril 22, 2008
One topic I find most interesting about Mormonism is the ability of the Latter-day Saints to create the sacred.
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By Ben PApril 10, 2008
A few months ago, while traveling on a rickety bus in Peru from Cusco to Puno, I read Craig Campbell’s Images of the New Jerusalem: Latter Day Saint Faction Interpretation of Independence, Missouri.
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By Ben PMarch 13, 2008
I am currently trying to situate Joseph Smith within the larger American romantic movement, and am hoping for some help. While there are a lot of similarities between Smith and the likes of Emerson, I also agree with Clark in believing that these similarities can be easily overstated (see here and here). While both hoped to collapse the distance between the sacred and the profane, I just can’t get over Joseph’s institutional thought. To me, while they both wanted to bring people into the presence of God, Emerson focused on self-reliance and nature while Joseph utilized the priesthood. It seems like for the early Mormons romanticism merely serv
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By Ben PMarch 11, 2008
If you are looking for a post that explores the rich theological possibilities of theodicy, this post is not it. While I find the topic interesting, I don’t want to address the questions associated with it here. Rather, I want to use the topic of theodicy as a starting point for a discussion on how we use Joseph’s teachings.
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