Church History Matters

Why Mental Flexibility is So Crucial for Durable Discipleship

A fundamental moment in all good learning is that moment where we modify our assumptions about the world as a result of acquiring new and more accurate knowledge. This in turn hopefully primes us to make better decisions. On one level, it’s what learning is all about. Sounds pretty basic right? Well, it is. But it isn’t always easy. Church History can teach us that modifying one’s assumptions can be a challenge for some when it requires them to rethink their ideas about God, prophets, and the Church. 
In this episode of Church History Matters we’re going to carefully look at this skill of humbly revising our assumptions in light of better or more accurate information—a skill we’re calling “mental flexibility”—and then take a look at key moments in the lives of a few people in our Church’s history that show us why this skill is so crucial for durable discipleship.
For show notes and transcript for this and other episodes go to https://doctrineandcovenantscentral.org/church-history-matters-podcast/   

Are Criticisms of the Book of Mormon Witnesses Defensible?

How can we confidently discern the difference between a reliable historical claim and an unreliable one? This is what Casey and I discussed in our last episode where we introduced five source critical questions we can all ask to carefully assess the reliability of a historical truth claim.  
In this episode of Church History Matters, we’re going to practice putting these five questions to work by actually using them to measure and evaluate various historical truth-claims about the witnesses of the Book of Mormon—a very high stakes topic with conflicting claims in the historical record.
For show notes and transcript for this and other episodes go to https://doctrineandcovenantscentral.org/church-history-matters-podcast/   

How Can We Think Like Historians?

How can we know what actually happened in the past? Whose stories are true? Piecing together accurate history can be tricky business. People in the past, like people today, were diverse. Some were honest. Some were not. Some were straight shooting truth tellers who gave honest (though subjective) accounts of what happened. Others emphasized or omitted specific details in ways that would serve their particular agenda. So, how should we think about and evaluate the reliability of historical claims and assertions to discern what is historically accurate from what is mistaken or misleading?
In this episode of Church History Matters, we dig into the basic toolbox trained historians use in their efforts to be “source critical.” And being source critical essentially means caring about where our information is coming from and being honest about what that information can and cannot tell us. It means we recognize that not all historical claims are created equal and so we aim to use only the best data to inform our understanding of the past. And while we cannot always protect ourselves from deception, developing the skill being source critical will greatly reduce the odds that we will be misled. So, in short, today is our crash course in learning how to think like a historian. 
For show notes and transcript for this and other episodes go to https://doctrineandcovenantscentral.org/church-history-matters-podcast/   

Workshopping the Three Lenses

How can we confidently determine what is and what is not reliable doctrine so we can decide what to believe? This is what Casey and I discussed in our last episode where we introduced what we called the Three Doctrinal Lenses, or criteria, by which we can assess the doctrinal reliability of a truth claim.  
In today’s episode of Church History Matters, we’re going to practice putting these three lenses to work by actually using them to measure and evaluate various theological truth-claims to determine the level of confidence we have in them. So, welcome to Scott and Casey’s doctrinal workshop! 
For show notes and transcript for this and other episodes go to https://doctrineandcovenantscentral.org/church-history-matters-podcast/   

How Do We Become Doctrinally Confident?

Just before he left home for college, eighteen year old Henry Eyring, the future world renowned LDS scientist, was invited by his father, Edward Eyring, to sit down for some fatherly counsel. After sharing his firm conviction that Joseph Smith was a true prophet whom God used to restore his church, Edward said to his son, “Now, there are a lot of other matters which are much less clear to me. But in this Church you don’t have to believe anything that isn’t true.”
In this Church you don’t have to believe anything that isn’t true. Hmm. This echoes President Dieter F. Uchtdorf’s teaching when he declared, “Latter-day Saints are not asked to blindly accept everything they hear. We are encouraged to think and discover truth for ourselves. We are expected to ponder, to search, to evaluate, and thereby to come to a personal knowledge of the truth.” 
So, how do we do this when it comes to theological or doctrinal truth? How can we confidently determine what is and what is not reliable doctrine so we can decide what to believe? 
In this episode of Church History Matters we dive into this very question and explore three vital questions to ask when evaluating all doctrinal truth claims.
For show notes and transcript for this and other episodes go to https://doctrineandcovenantscentral.org/church-history-matters-podcast/   

What Do You Know? And How Do You Know It?

What is truth? What does it mean to really “know” something? And what are the best methods and tools to come to know a thing? 
In today’s episode of Church History Matters, we begin our new series on Good Thinking where we explore the important role our brain and intellect play in truth seeking and the life of faith. Specifically in this series we want to explore what mental moves are made, or what frameworks of thinking are used by intelligent, critically thinking Latter-day Saints whose faith is strengthened rather than damaged by diving deeply into our Church’s history and doctrine. So this should be fun.
For show notes and transcript for this and other episodes go to https://doctrineandcovenantscentral.org/church-history-matters-podcast/   

Q&R with Dr. Kerry Muhlestein! Tough Book of Abraham Questions

There was in 2nd Century BC Egypt an indisputable multicultural sharing of religious ideas between Jews, Greeks, and Egyptians. How should that fact influence how we evaluate Joseph Smith’s interpretations of the Abraham facsimiles in general and individual hieroglyphics on the facsimiles specifically? 
On a related note, some of Joseph’s descriptions of Facsimile #2 contain temple themes, saying more will be revealed about those in the temple. Can Egyptologists today read those hieroglyphs? And are they actually connected in any way to what we learn about in our modern temples? 
Also, Dr. Robert Ritner is an Egyptologist who has critiqued LDS scholarship on the Book of Abraham. Has he been adequately responded to? 
And finally, what are the top three most solid intellectual evidences for the book of Abraham having ancient connections which Joseph Smith could not have known about?
In today’s episode of Church History Matters, we dive into all of these questions and more with Dr. Kerry Muhlestein, an Eyptologist and scholar on the Book of Abraham. 
For show notes and transcript for this and other episodes go to https://doctrineandcovenantscentral.org/church-history-matters-podcast/   

Beyond Book of Abraham Controversies

So, the Book of Abraham is the touchpoint of some serious controversies—and we’ve talked about some of those in our last two episodes and we’ll probably talk about them more next week as well. But, to be clear, the Book of Abraham is also the source of some dazzling doctrinal gems which validate and expand upon other key restoration teachings. 
So, in this episode of Church History Matters we leave the controversial to bask, however briefly, in what makes the book of Abraham beautiful to us. 
For show notes and transcript for this and other episodes go to https://doctrineandcovenantscentral.org/church-history-matters-podcast/   

The Abraham Facsimile Conundrum: Is it All or Nothing?

In Joseph Smith’s interpretations of the facsimiles found in our Pearl of Great Price he ties all three of them to Abraham; yet, when some modern Egyptologists look at those same facsimiles today they say they have nothing to do with Abraham: one is simply an embalming scene, one a disk representing the eye of Horus, and one a judgment scene from an Egyptian book of the dead. So, is this an either or, sudden-death scenario? Must we, in the name of honesty and rationality, pick a side? Must we either throw out modern Egyptologists by choosing to stand with the prophet Joseph on the one hand, or throw out Joseph by choosing to align with modern Egyptologists on the other? Or is there a reconciliatory third path in which both interpretations can be true at the same time?  
In this episode of Church History Matters, we tackle this important question by looking at some of the best scholarship on the issue. And on our way, we’ll also briefly look at something called the Kirtland Egyptian papers and discuss a minor controversy associated with those.   
For show notes and transcript for this and other episodes go to https://doctrineandcovenantscentral.org/church-history-matters-podcast/   

The Book of Abraham: Origins and Controversies

The book of Abraham, Joseph Smith’s final translation project, is easily one of the most controversial books of scripture in the Latter-day Saint canon. And we want to talk about it.
In this episode of Church History Matters, we dig into the fascinating story of how the exploits of a 19th century grave robber in Egypt ended up expanding our scriptural canon! We look at where in Egypt the papyri from which the Book of Abraham was purportedly translated came from and how Joseph Smith came to possess both this papyri and a couple pair of mummies. We examine three theories of what source material Joseph Smith translated from and how he did it. And we trace what we know of what happened to the papyri after Joseph’s death, how much has survived to this day, and what modern Egyptologists think about the surviving fragments—which is the source of the two biggest controversies regarding the Book of Abraham.
For show notes and transcript for this and other episodes go to https://doctrineandcovenantscentral.org/church-history-matters-podcast/