Category: Antiquity
Relational Faith: An Essential Book for Understanding “Faith” as Used in New Testament Times and for Appreciating the Restoration
There’s a new book, Brent Schmidt’s Relational Faith, that may be one of the best resources around to help Latter-day Saints and perhaps many other Christians understand and explain what…
Geocentric Astronomy in the Book of Abraham? Dan Vogel’s Refutation of LDS Scholars
Circumpolar star trails in a long-exposure photo of several hours, showing that stars closer to Polaris move on shorter trails, thus moving more slowly. The circumpolar stars always stay…
An Update in the Scholarship Regarding the Archaic Language in the Book of Mormon
One of the most interesting puzzles about the Book of Mormon is the recent discovery that much of the language is archaic in ways not easily explained by imitating the…
Plagiarism Made Harder, or, The Book of Ether and the Genius of Joseph’s Plagiarism
Students of the Book of Mormon have long noted that the brief book of Ether is quite different in its content and style than the rest of the Book of…
More on the Meaning of the Kirtland Egyptian Papers: Recent Explorations Based on Comments at Interpreter
One of the best things about finally having a reply from the Joseph Smith Papers Project on the issue of alleged flaws in scholarship in their volume on the Book…
Sights from a Trip to Israel and Jordan
One of the advantages of working in China is having long national holidays like the Chinese New Year, making it easier to take interesting trips to other lands. There’s a…
John 8 and the Woman Taken in Adultery: A Faith Promoting Fabrication?
For years I’ve had a question mark in my mind over John 8:1-11 with its beautiful and inspiring story of Christ’s merciful treatment of the woman taken in adultery. The…
The Egyptian Context for the Book of Abraham: Why Hor, Priest of Thebes, Might Want an Abraham Text
One of the important but often overlooked issues in the debate over the origins of the Book of Abraham is why the ancient Egyptian owner of the Joseph Smith papyri…
An Ancient Tradition of Writing on Metal? Surprise (?) from a Newly Translated Ancient Hebrew Text
“Fate of Ark of the Covenant Revealed in Hebrew Text” is the title of an intriguing news item at LiveScience.com dated Jan. 7, 2014. It discusses a newly translated ancient…
Chrism, Temples, and Interesting Books and Texts
There are a few books I’d like recommend to serious LDS students of the Temple. Several time previously I’ve mentioned Sinai and Zion: An Entry into the Jewish Bible by…
