How Thomas Aquinas?s Theory Of Scripture Explains Why Jimmer Fredette Is The Hinge On Which Modern Mormonism Pivots

(Part whatever of my ongoing investigation into the cultural intersections of religion and basketball; part I, on the intertwining cultural meanings of Mormonism and the Utah Jazz, can be found here; part II, a review of the religious pilgrimage of Cleveland Cavaliers bit player Lance Allred, here; part III, on the Puritan antecedents of LeBron James nemesis Dan Gilbert, here.)

The author of Holy Scripture is God, in whose power it is to signify His meaning, not by words only (as man also can do), but also by things themselves. So, whereas in every other science things are signified by words, this science has the property, that the things signified by the words have themselves also a signification. Therefore that first signification whereby words signify things belongs to the first sense, the historical or literal.   That signification whereby things signified by words have themselves also a signification is called the spiritual sense, which is based on the literal, and presupposes it.    Now this spiritual sense has a threefold division. For as the Apostle says (Hebrews 10:1) the Old Law is a figure of the New Law, and Dionysius says [Coel. Hier. i] “the New Law itself is a figure of future glory.” Again, in the New Law, whatever our Head has done is a type of what we ought to do. Therefore, so far as the things of the Old Law signify the things of the New Law, there is the allegorical sense; so far as the things done in Christ, or so far as the things which signify Christ, are types of what we ought to do, there is the moral sense. But so far as they signify what relates to eternal glory, there is the anagogical sense.

– Thomas Aquinas,Summa Theologica 1.1.10.

Like Walt Whitman, and Holy Scripture properly understood, Jimmer Fredette contains multitudes. 

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Being Biblical

I took a directed readings course for one of my last classes at BYU, and one of the books was about colonial New Englanders? notions of America as a promised land. While that may seem rather innocuous, I was struck by the similarities to Mormon notions and the fact that JS would have been immersed in that culture (no getting around the fact that he would have been influenced by such ideas). When I met with the professor to discuss the book I mentioned my concern and I think he sort of made a joke. But then seeing that I still looked concerned he simply said, ?it?s in the Bible.? That made me feel better.

In the process of getting comfortable with finding Mormon-looking ideas in JS?s environment, I’ve wondered why I felt this way. I think the impulse derives from the feeling that the Bible is a legitimate source, whereas other sources may not be. This is a very Protestant approach.

JS seemed to have a different approach though.

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Joseph Smith and Matthew Philip Gill: the dynamics of Mormon schism

Jacob Baker and I discovered the Latter Day Church of Jesus Christ while Bushman summer fellows in 2007.    We spent a lot of time kicking back and forth analysis of this most interesting schism group, and organized an MHA panel around them in 2008.    And, today, the turgid pace of academic publishing has finally reached consummation, and the paper I wrote that summer has been published in the current issue of Nova Religio 14:3 (February 2011) 42-63.

The Latter Day Church is fascinating in part because of how skillfully Matthew Philip Gill engages in prophetic mimesis, replicating the experiences and language of Joseph Smith to create himself as Smith’s heir, calling to repentance the failed church of Salt Lake City and promising a re-invigorated version of Mormon spirituality – one which both invokes Joseph Smith’s charisma anew, but which also rewrites the sacred history of Mormonism in ways that follow the cultural accommodations the LDS church has made.   Gill’s movement is neither sectarian – which seeks to heighten tension with Western culture – nor a church movement – one which seeks to lessen that tension.  Rather, scholars like Armand Mauss and Thomas O’Dea have observed that the LDS Church itself seems to combine both of these impulses, oscillating back and forth along a spectrum of resistance, tension, and accommodation.  Just so, the Latter Day Church of Christ itself seeks to heighten both resistance and accommodation – rejecting, for instance, evidence that Joseph Smith ever practiced polygamy and embracing whole-heartedly the LDS church’s sentimental emphasis upon the family, but also heightening the sort of radical spiritual claims which have become routinized in American Mormonism.   Gill, after all, has had visionary experiences of all the figures Joseph Smith claimed to have encountered, adding a resurrected Joseph himself into the bargain.   As his father (and first counselor) asks derisively of the LDS Church, “We have again an era of prophets.  Proper prophets.  Not people who are just put into position and over time get to be a prophet . . . Where?s the revelation in that?”    And such is a new church born.

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Some Thoughts on the Mormon Kingdom of God, circa 1840s

[As a heads-up, this post does not attempt to make any claims or arguments. It’s just a few half-baked thoughts concerning early Mormon notions of the Kingdom of God and how it related to Americanism, specifically during the 1840s. I hope it generates some discussion–or, at least–encourages some thought on what I think may be an under-utilized approach to early Mormon history.]

It’s almost considered a common trope nowadays to describe Mormonism as “the quintessential American religion”–or something in those regards. Harold Bloom may be most famous for recently making such a claim, but the sentiment has been around a long time. An American-born prophet, an American-located Garden of Eden, a canonized revelation extolling the American Constitution, an American-centered headquarters–you get the idea. The question of how Mormons in the nineteenth century understood their relationship with the United States has received a lot of attention in recent decades, with good reason. It is a fascinating story of how Mormons both rejected America—by becoming fed up with persecution and mobocracy and moving West—while still holding the pure “ideal” of America and merely equating their contemporary nation as experiencing an apostasy akin to modern-day Christianity. Mormon scriptures both placed America the location at the center of future divine events while also prophesying the downfall of America the government as a necessary apocalyptic sign paving the way for the millennium. The paradoxical positioning of both rejecting and embracing the American image was at the center of the Mormon sense of self during the late-Nauvoo and early-Utah periods.

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Johann Gottlieb Fichte and Interpreting Early Mormon Thought

[What follows is the gist of the introduction from my paper “Celestial Family Organization: The Developing Nature of Mormon Conceptions of Heaven, circa 1840s,” presented at the 2010 MHA Conference.]

This post begins with a seemingly unrelated starting point: the debate over the legacy of Kantian philosophy in 1790s Germany. Philosopher Johann Gottlieb Fichte, in defense of his interpretation of Kantian idealism, argued for a distinction between ?the inventor? of an ideological system, and ?his commentators and disciples.? Fichte explained,

The inventor of a system is one thing, and his commentators and disciples are another?The reason is this: The followers do not yet have the idea of the whole; for if they had it, they would not require to study the new system; they are obliged first to piece together this idea out of the parts that the inventor provides for them; [but] all these parts are in fact not wholly determined, rounded and polished in their minds?

Fichte continued by explaining ?the inventor proceeds from the idea of the whole, in which all the parts are united, and sets for these parts individually?The business of the followers,? on the other hand, ?is to synthesize what they still by no means possess, but are only to obtain by the synthesis.?[1]

The specifics of Kantian philosophy that Fichte was debating hold little importance to us, but the tension he outlines between an ?inventor? and ?disciple? plays an important correlating role in the development of early Mormon thought, just as it does with any movement that boasts an innovative founder.

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“A Uniformity So Complete”: Early Mormon Angelology

[To continue my attempt to post something without much work on my part, what follows is the introduction to my recent article, just put online by the Intermountain West Journal of Religious Studies. I post this also to encourage other graduate students to consider submitting to IMW Journal in the future; while it is a student-run production, it boasts an impressive academic review board with professional and respected scholars to help improve your submission; I received great feedback on my earlier drafts that significantly improved the article. To view the articles from the most recent issue, as well as to see submission guidelines,  click here.]

?An angel of God never has wings,? proclaimed Joseph Smith in 1839, just as the LDS Church was establishing itself in what would come to be known as Nauvoo, Illinois.

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New Article: “Salvation Through a Tabernacle: Joseph Smith, Parley P. Pratt, and Early Mormon Theologies of Embodiment”

[The following is the introduction to my recently published article in Dialogue. I post it here with three goals in mind: 1) To get any feedback/corrections/accusations on the article, as well as to provide discussion for anyone else who finds the topic as fascinating as I do. 2) To fulfill my guilt and anxiety to post something of substance here, but doing so without much work on my part. 3) To remind everyone what a great resource Dialogue is, and how awesome they are for strengthening their online presence. For those who haven’t done so yet, go to their website right now and subscribe and/or donate!]

A Kingdom of Priests: Progress and Patronage in Early Mormonism’s Heaven

[In the spirit of transparency, I admit that what follows is an attempt to use the JI as a sounding board for ideas from my upcoming MHA presentation. Critiques are greatly appreciated.]

In 1787, after spending the last two decades of his life working toward American independence and a new form of democratic government, Benjamin Franklin noted that ?there is a natural inclination in mankind for a kingly government.?[1] He was speaking in Philadelphia to the framers of the Constitution, many of whom had grown disillusioned with the potential for radical social movement the early American republic had experienced, and envisioned their own natural aristocracy as the pinnacle of society.[2] Less than a half-decade later, Philadelphia became the location of the most recent of at least a dozen publications of the satirical novel The History and Adventures of Joseph Andrews. Written by British author Henry Fielding, Joseph Andrews mocked the aristocratic foundations of the eighteenth century, especially its ?whole ladder of dependence,? and the novel?s printing success in post-Revolutionary America demonstrates the culture?s acceptance of radical Whig philosophy that revolted against a fixed social status.[3]

The Trinity

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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What does Thomas Paine have to do with the Book of Moses? A Footnote to Sunday School Lesson 1 (Moses 1)

[While I sit in the Pisa Airport finishing my Sunday School Lesson for tomorrow, I couldn’t help but share a point of convergence between the lesson and my recent scholarly research (I am currently working on the Christian response to Thomas Paine in the 1790s). What follows is not a fully drawn-out, or perhaps even thought-out, post, but rather a half-baked idea worthy of nothing more than a footnote for tomorrow’s SS class.]

The 1790s represented drastic change for western civilization. On one side of the Atlantic, the early American republic was beginning to forge into a stable nation; on the other side, an early-embraced revolution was evolving into dangerous anarchy in France.

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