Volume 5 of the Revelations and Translations series from the Joseph Smith Papers Project presents all extant fragments of the original manuscript of the Book of Mormon. For the first time ever, researchers have access to a photograph and color-coded transcripts of each fragment of the manuscript, showing every change made and which scribe made it.

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Readers of the Tanak or Old Testament see that The Lord marks Israel as a chosen people. Modern Latter-day Saints identify with being a “peculiar people.”  But what does it mean to be a chosen people? And how does one’s peculiarity mark boundaries of values, identity, and peoplehood? Chosenness does not mean a life without disappointment or despair, but it does bring comfort in recognizing the divine power of our Heavenly Parents’ love for all of their children.

In today’s episode of Abide: A Maxwell Institute Podcast, we dive into Genesis 28-33 to explore Chosenness in three ways: covenant relationships, expectations, and longing as it affects the ancient Israelites and modern Saints alike.

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As Genesis marches on we are introduced to new people, whose lives are in some ways different than our own, but in many ways are similar. In this episode of “Abide: A Maxwell Institute Podcast,” we meet Isaac and Rebekah, who push us to think about what our responsibilities are in our families, and how we can understand people and their faith in all their complexity.

My name is Joseph Stuart, I’m the public communications specialist at the Maxwell Institute. Kristian Heal is a Research Fellow at the Institute, and each week we will be discussing the week’s block of reading from The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints’ “Come, Follow Me” curriculum. We aren’t here to present a lesson, but rather to hit on a few key themes from the scripture block, so as to help fulfill the Maxwell Institute’s mission to “inspire and fortify Latter-day Saints in their testimonies of the restored gospel of Jesus Christ and engage the world of religious ideas.”

Today we are joined by one of our research assistants, Carolyn Lowman, an Ancient Near East History, Hebrew Bible major here at BYU from Southern California. After Carolyn graduates she plans to be a seminary teacher.

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Today, Dr. Elisa Eastwood Pulido joins us to discuss her book, The Spiritual Evolution of Margarito Bautista: Mexican Mormon Evangelizer, Polygamist Dissident, and Utopian Founder, 1878-1961 (Oxford University Press, 2020). Dr. Pulido’s book is the first full-length biography of Margarito Bautista (1878-1961), a celebrated Latino Mormon leader in the U.S. and Mexico in the early twentieth century who was a Mexican cultural nationalist, visionary, founder of a utopian commune, and Mormon dissident. Surprisingly little is known about Bautista’s remarkable life, the scope of his work, or the development of his vision. Elisa Eastwood Pulido draws on his letters, books, pamphlets, and unpublished diaries to provide a lens through which to view the convergence of Mormon evangelization, Mexican nationalism, and religious improvisation in the U.S. Mexico borderlands.

The post Maxwell Institute Podcast #138: The Biography of Margarito Bautista, with Elisa Eastwood Pulido appeared first on Neal A. Maxwell Institute | BYU.

The Lectures on Faith teaches that, “…a religion that does not require the sacrifice of all things never has the power sufficient to produce the faith necessary unto life and salvation.” But how much can we be asked to sacrifice? For Abraham, he seemed to have been asked to sacrifice in a myriad of ways. First, he placed his faith on the altar by waiting for a child with his wife, Sarah. Second, and more famously God commanded him to sacrifice his long-awaited son, Isaac on a literal altar. How can we approach this as modern Latter-day Saints with a context of near ancient eastern history and culture? We’ll discuss that and more on today’s episode of Abide: A Maxwell Institute Podcast.

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Have you ever had anyone ask you “what is scripture?” For such a short question it has the possibility to open up into thousands of answers. For Latter-day Saints, it can be defined as “whatsoever [God’s representatives] shall speak when moved upon by the Holy Ghost.” This definition is somewhat broader than many other Christian definitions of scripture, incorporating both written and spoken modes of inspiration. At the end of the day, though, scripture must be interpreted by the power of the Holy Ghost for edification.

In the past several hundred years, though, some have looked to academic tools to prove the truth of religious texts. Professionals from fields like history, archaeology, and anthropology have sought to add detail from the empirical record to sacred texts. Those professionals are often women and men of faith. But what are the limits of using academic tools to “prove” religious truth? And how did that play out in the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints’ during the first decades of the twentieth century? 

Today, Dr. Matthew Bowman of Claremont Graduate University is going to discuss that with us today, focusing on his article entitled “Biblical Criticism, the Book of Mormon, and the Meanings of Civilization,” in the most recent issue of The Journal of Book of Mormon Studies. We’ll include a copy of the article in our newsletter, which you can subscribe to at mi.byu.edu/monthly-mi-news.

The post Maxwell Institute Podcast #137: BH Roberts, the Bible, and the Book of Mormon, with Matthew Bowman appeared first on Neal A. Maxwell Institute | BYU.

Introduction: The world of the Old Testament, like our own day, is swimming in violence. From the direct and intimate violence of person-to-person interaction to the structural violence that reinforce hunger, war, and inequality, each of us is affected by others’ use of force. Despite this reality, or perhaps because of it, the Lord commanded us to “proclaim peace” to the world and to follow the Prince of Peace. In choosing peace we are rejecting our own desires for results, for others to bend to our will, in order to align our will with the Lord’s. 

On today’s episode of “Abide: A Maxwell Institute Podcast,” we discuss Noah, the Tower of Babel, and violence, thinking broadly about what we can learn from violence in scripture.

The post Abide: Genesis 6-11 and Moses 8 appeared first on Neal A. Maxwell Institute | BYU.

Moses 7 features Enoch, a figure that receives scant attention in Genesis, but has an overwhelming impact on the Pearl of Great Price. Importantly, Enoch’s experience with God also shapes how we view the Father, His relationship to us, and recognize his character and disposition. In today’s episode of Abide, we discuss Moses 7 and how it contributes to Latter-day Saint ideas. 

My name is Joseph Stuart, I’m the public communications specialist at the Maxwell Institute. Kristian Heal is a Research Fellow at the Institute, and each week we will be discussing the week’s block of reading from The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints’ “Come, Follow Me” curriculum. We aren’t here to present a lesson, but rather to hit on a few key themes from the scripture block, so as to help fulfill the Maxwell Institute’s mission to “inspire and fortify Latter-day Saints in their testimonies of the restored gospel of Jesus Christ and engage the world of religious ideas.”

Today we are joined by special guest Terryl Givens, who with Fiona Givens has written The God Who Weeps: How Mormonism Makes Sense of Life and, recently, The Doors of Faith from the Maxwell Institute’s Living Faith series and Deseret Book. 

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