Posted on 09/09/2012 8:00:06 PM PDT by NorthernCrunchyCon
This work was originally published in Dialogue: A Journal of Mormon Thought, Vol. 27, No. 3, Fall 1994, pp. 117-194. The paper received considerable notice, and in 1995 the Mormon History Association recognized Joseph Smith and Kabbalah: The Occult Connection with its annual award for the best article in Mormon studies. [snip]
The one thing about which we might all agree concerning Joseph Smith is that he was not the usual sort of person. He did not approach life itself--or his religious commitment--in a usual way. Yet the character of our historical investigation of Joseph Smith and his times has been primarily traditional, unimaginative, and lacking in any effort to find or create an epistemological methodology revolutionary enough to deal with the paradox of our movement. The irony of our position is that many of our methods and interpretations have become so traditional that they can only reinforce the fears of yesterday rather than nurture the seeds of tomorrow's dreams.1
More than two decades have passed since those words were penned, years marked by a veritable explosion in Mormon studies, and yet Edward's challenge "to find or create an epistemological methodology revolutionary enough to deal with the paradox" of Joseph Smith remains a summons largely unanswered. Revolutions are painful processes, in measure both destructive and creative. The imaginative revisioning of Joseph Smith's "unusual approach" to life and religion, demands a careful--though perhaps still difficult and destructive--hewing away of an hundred years of encrusting vilifications and thick layerings of iconographic pigments, masks ultimately false to his lively cast. Smith eschewed orthodoxy, and so eventually must his historians. To that end, there is considerable value in turning full attention to the revolutionary view of Joseph Smith provided by Harold Bloom in his critique of The American Religion.
(Excerpt) Read more at gnosis.org ...
we got a lot worse than Mormans to worry about.
Yep! Like a “religion” that will lie to us and cut off our heads if we don’t submit.
Yeah. Like the Saxons.
I’ll take a Mormon president over a Marxist one.
Nice try fellas.
This is the religion forum and someone posted about mormonism.
Try and keep up, ok?
You win, first post on this religion forum thread to bring in politics.
Such an honor.
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Interesting
Ill take the mormon over the homosexual marxist muslim.
Discuss the issues all you want, but do not make it personal.
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This thread is in the religion forum not the news/activism forum, which means this is a religious discussion, you are appearing to jump to conclusionsotherwise.
mormonism has been discussed in the religion forum since before 2003, however because of the current political situation, some people are just now noticing.
Who cares? We have this freedom of religion thing...
I am curious, who said we don’t.
This is a really interesting study into some early mormonism foundational issues.
Mormons have done that. Read up on Mormon blood atonement.
Don’t make it personal, k? Anyway, they do indeed have some astounding theological differences don’t they? I could never believe their beliefs. Thats for sure! However, they sure are clean, respectful and polite.
One of their bizzare beliefs (in my opinion) is that Christ popped down in America personally, to talk with the indians. But when i really think about it, how is that any different than Catholics believing Mary popped down outside of Mexico city in 1531 and talked to Juan Diego? (another indian) Interesting that we find one to be fantastic, and the other plausible.
Not sure saying apparently...is making it personal.
I know nothing about Mary and the new world, never heard that before, regardless there is a huge difference between Mary and Jesus.
The lds are clean and respectful because they must work for their salvation, there is no Grace.
And they are working for godhood of their own planets.
Indians used to cut the scalps off Christians. We ain't mad at them anymore.
I don’t know why everyone is so ‘down’ on Mormons anyway.
As a general rule, based on their behavior, whatever heaven is, I bet they get in first.
I mean, isn’t the important thing HOW they act, and not really WHY ?
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