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Christian History

Prospectus Part 2

By November 28, 2010


Here’s some more of my prospectus that deals with the issues of pre-Reformation survivals. Some of this I’ve posted around here already but I contextualize it here a little differently.

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My Prospectus

By November 25, 2010


Ann Taves, my adviser, signed off on me sending this out to my committee a few days ago. The whole things is over 30 pages so I just include the first part here.

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?The Mystery of Iniquity?: John Wesley?s View of the Apostasy

By October 4, 2010


Continuing on this theme, I wanted to give a little summary of John Wesley?s view of the apostasy. Wesley, whose Methodist movement was highly influential on Mormonism, was very interested in ?the mystery of iniquity? or how Christianity had become corrupted. His speech by that name covers his views on the issue (Wesley?s Works vol. 3, Sermon 61) and offers additional, useful ways to look at the apostasy.

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Innocent III and the Papal Monarchy: Church and State in the Middle Ages

By September 19, 2010


Continuing my theme of rethinking our metanarrative of apostasy to resotration, I wanted to talk a little more about the Middle Ages.

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Problematizing the Reformation: Sola Scriptura and Cessation

By July 26, 2010


Desidrius Erasmus was the most learned man of his day and in the spirit of the Renaissance he sought to get back to the original sources of wisdom (often called Christian Humanism). For Erasmus this meant the Fathers over the Scholastics, Origin over Augustine and, of course, the Greek Bible (which he translated into Latin) over all. Said Erasmus (in a 16th century English translation) ?I wold to god they were translated in to the tonges of all men, so that they might not only be read and knowne of the scotes and yrishmen, but also of the Turkes and sarracenes ? I wold to god the plowman wold singe a texte of the scripture at his plowbeme.? [1]

This sentiment tends to be credited to William Tyndale the father of the English Bible:

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Rethinking the Reformation

By July 11, 2010


I?ve argued around here that we Mormons have tended to borrow the Protestant metanarrative of history in seeking to lay out how we get from Apostasy to Restoration: early Catholics corrupt the church, on come the dark ages, Luther brings light back into the world by focusing on the scriptures and breaking with the wicked pope, setting the stage for the Restoration.

A little more autobiography if you?ll indulge me.

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Review Essay: The Dechristianization Thesis

By June 15, 2010


Jon Butler argued in Awash in a Sea of Faith: Christianizing the American People that colonial Americans were not really “Christianized” until late in the eighteenth century. In making his argument, Butler was essentially applying the “dechristianization” thesis to colonial America (he mentions Mormons in a later chapter). To shed light on these arguments, I wanted to summarize the debates over the dechristianization thesis.

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Why the Late Middle Ages Are Important for Understanding Mormonism

By March 22, 2010


So when David G. was introducing his “academic friends” (his words) to his new wife at their reception, he gave her a little summation of everybody’s research. When he got to me he simply said “I can’t really explain what he does.” I know I’ve brought this predicament on myself, so to try to remedy this little problem I have, I decided to post a little write-up I did for my medieval professor.

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The Trinity

By January 10, 2010


I know this has been discussed around the blogernacle, but I just wanted to share a few historical anecdotes.

The first time I read the Nicene Creed (on my mission) I thought, ?do we really disagree with this?? This thought has only been compounded as I?ve studied Christian history.

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Eric on Study and Faith, 5:: “But that's not what I was saying about the nature of evidence of an unknown civilization. I am talking about linguistics, not ruins. …”


Steve Fleming on Study and Faith, 5:: “Large civilizations leave behind evidence of their existence. For instance, I just read that scholars estimate the kingdom of Judah to have been around 110,000…”


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