Christian Apologetic Patterns

[salgare]

Steve,

I'm very interested in if other Christian Apologetics follow similar patterns as to those of Mormon apologists.

What might also interest you is poking around into the history of Mormon Apologetics which is relatively young/new, starting with Hugh Nibley being considered by most as the Father of Mormon Apologetics. Others can correct me, but I'd say Lou Midgley then took up the gantlet along Dan Petersen and a tight niche group that carried the load for 30 years. This group ended up known as FARMS which the Church eventually bought out and moved into the Niel A Maxwell Institute at BYU.  Their style of apologetics was very ad hominem based which you will still see around here in some.  There is a recent history (what 5 years back?) of their getting booted out of the Maxwell Institute, for reasons that have a fascinating and super heated history of its own (remember John Dehlin in this regard, another fascinating history to follow). 

Some critics referred to this group as "The old Guard" which was replaced with "The new Guard" of which the old guard utilized all of their old ad hominem against the new guard and BYU for firing them and clearing them out.  These went on for several years after the firing.  A portion of these attacks were over accusations that the new guard were following some of the Nuanced Mormons and did not believe in the historicity of the BoM. Critics believe that the Church needed gentler apologitics and heavily influenced the firiing.     This is the first "pattern" I would like to ask about.

A gentler generation of potential apologist were evolving out of a Professor at (someone please help with name) in California named Richard Lyman Bushman, author of Rough Stone Rolling.  This was the first real appearance of transparency as Richard was not excommunicated for publishing a book that others had been excommunicated for revealing.  A few of the younger men that come from those studies and have posted about found the ad hominem ways of the old guard to be very undesirable and they tend to reflect just about 180 degree opposites in their demeanor with others.  This is the second pattern.

The third pattern is Terryl Givens and his wife.  These are the Nuanced Mormons.

The Church has no official apologetic and the critics have suggested that the above patterns have actually driven/changed doctrine and Church policy, as most of the General Authorities of even 15 years ago had little knowledge and understanding of the history and doctrinal issues.

Of course none of these groups claim to represent the Church, and yet it is obvious (to critics at least) that the Church supports these efforts as they are the ones writing the books, doing the various private organization conventions, working these sites etc.  They are what Joe Public who investigates will see.  They are the intellectuals and scholars whom the GA's turn to for advice etc.

It's this third pattern that is of great interest to me.  They travel the country doing "firesides" (present talks/preach in Church owned Chapels) directed at members with doubts.  Those who have been off put with the likes of pattern one, generated doubts that are crashing their shelves based on pattern two, are presented with pattern three, the option that Humanism is where its at, make it whatever works for you, no need for orthodoxy or doctrines or God for that matter.

The Church obviously supports their teaching Nuanced Mormonism as it allows them to use their Chapels and have never called them to a court of love for extensive public teaching of what the first two patterns above might well consider apostasy (i.e. a non-historical BoM).

I'm interested to know if these kinds of shenanigans are common among other Christian communities, where not only do the critics need to be handled publicly, but internal member losses call for other unofficial apologetics focused at active members. 

 

[Kevin Christensen]

Quote

This group ended up known as FARMS which the Church eventually bought out and moved into the Niel A Maxwell Institute at BYU.  Their style of apologetics was very ad hominem based which you will still see around here in some. 

Uhmm... I have actually read every volume of the FARMS Review over the 23 years in question (and much more from FARMS), and am one of the over 300 different individuals who contributed to that publication, and therefore consider myself informed enough to question the characterization of FARMS as "very ad hominem based."

I also know what is and is not ad hominem, which is not always true of those who toss the accusation at FARMS.

http://en.fairmormon.org/Mormonism_and_apologetics/%22ad_hominem%22

FWIW

Kevin Christensen

Canonsburg, PA

 

Edited April 7, 2016 by Kevin Christensen
typo

[oremites]

40 minutes ago, salgare said:

I'm interested to know if these kinds of shenanigans are common among other Christian communities...

Definitions of shenanigans:
1. a. mischief; prankishness:
    b. deceit; trickery.
2. a mischievous or deceitful trick, practice, etc.

I'm curious why you think that anything you described amounts to "shenanigans".

 

[salgare]

22 minutes ago, Kevin Christensen said:

Uhmm... I have actually read every volume of the FARMS Review over the 23 years in question (and much more from FARMS), and am one of the over 300 different individuals who contributed to that publications, and therefore consider myself informed enough to question the characterization of FARMS as "very ad hominem based."

I also know what is and is not ad hominem, which is not always true of those who toss the accusation at FARMS.

http://en.fairmormon.org/Mormonism_and_apologetics/%22ad_hominem%22

FWIW

Kevin Christensen

Canonsburg, PA

 

Do you agree that its reputation was such by outsiders?

For example, IMO, the final straw from GA's for Dan was the times magazine photo incident where he went ballistic on the photographer for his photo gallery of seemingly unhappy Mormons in Happy Valley.

Edited April 7, 2016 by salgare

[Kevin Christensen]

Reputation and reality are not necessarily the same thing. Hence my post. 

If I want to call myself a scholar, I ought to know the difference.  The decision to fire Daniel Peterson in 2012 was made by Gerald Bradford who is not a GA.  Speculation without evidence of GA involvement is just that.   And there seems to have been no move to fire Peterson from BYU, nor to discourage him from speaking publicly, blogging regularly, publishing regular essays in the Desert News, and for continuing 18 volumes (and counting) of the Interpreter, and participating at FAIRMormon.

FWIW

Kevin Christensen

Canonsburg, PA

[Scott Lloyd]

6 minutes ago, Kevin Christensen said:

Reputation and reality are not necessarily the same thing. Hence my post. 

If I want to call myself a scholar, I ought to know the difference.  The decision to fire Daniel Peterson in 2012 was made by Gerald Bradford who is not a GA.  Speculation without evidence of GA involvement is just that.   And there seems to have been no move to fire Peterson from BYU, nor to discourage him from speaking publicly, blogging regularly, publishing regular essays in the Desert News, and for continuing 18 volumes (and counting) of the Interpreter, and participating at FAIRMormon.

FWIW

Kevin Christensen

Canonsburg, PA

Peterson himself has said that he has it from a highly well-placed source (about as well-placed as it can get) that there was no General Authority involvement in his removal as editor of Mormon Studies Review.

I believe him.

[boblloyd91]

I guess to answer the OP, you could look at Walter Martin's Christian Research Institute and the drama that followed that

[salgare]

43 minutes ago, oremites said:

Definitions of shenanigans:
1. a. mischief; prankishness:
    b. deceit; trickery.
2. a mischievous or deceitful trick, practice, etc.

I'm curious why you think that anything you described amounts to "shenanigans".

 

Apologetics influencing doctrine and policy when we have 15 prophets seers and revelators.  Supporting the givens behind the scenes but not willing to support them over the puplit.

 

[salgare]

27 minutes ago, Scott Lloyd said:

Peterson himself has said that he has it from a highly well-placed source (about as well-placed as it can get) that there was no General Authority involvement in his removal as editor of Mormon Studies Review.

I believe him.

John has known contacts as well and I believe him.  But I don't want to derail too soon, I'm wondering with the falloff of interest in organized religion in general what apologetics might be like and if it is also changing in other organizations

 

[cinepro]

32 minutes ago, Scott Lloyd said:

Peterson himself has said that he has it from a highly well-placed source (about as well-placed as it can get) that there was no General Authority involvement in his removal as editor of Mormon Studies Review.

I believe him.

I'm totally ignorant of FARMS/BYU/Church leadership internal politics, but the fact that there was no intervention preventing his removal either means they didn't know about it, knew about it and weren't able to stop it, or something else.

Edited April 7, 2016 by cinepro

[salgare]

11 minutes ago, boblloyd91 said:

I guess to answer the OP, you could look at Walter Martin's Christian Research Institute and the drama that followed that

I will look into this, thanks for the name reference 

[cinepro]

9 minutes ago, salgare said:

Apologetics influencing doctrine and policy when we have 15 prophets seers and revelators.  Supporting the givens behind the scenes but not willing to support them over the puplit.

 

[Kevin Christensen]

1 hour ago, cinepro said:

I'm totally ignorant of FARMS/BYU/Church leadership internal politics, but the fact that there was no intervention preventing his removal either means they didn't know about it, knew about it and weren't able to stop it, or something else.

Doesn't it seem that stating your total ignorance of FARMS BYU Internal affairs, despite the fact that people like Peterson and Hamblin who were involved have provided detailed insider views, including correspondence from the time, on this board and elsewhere suggest that readers might be justified in being a wee bit cynical about your rather vague but sinister sounding speculation that they "knew, ... didn't... or something else"? 

What do "they" think about Peterson's employment at BYU as a Professor of Arabic, or as a regular columnist at the Deseret News, or the 18 volumes of Interpreter?  In light of such telling and vaguely sinister facts for which there has been no intervention, do they "know, don't or--shudder--something else?"

Kevin Christensen

Canonsburg, PA

Edited April 7, 2016 by Kevin Christensen
typo

[cinepro]

1 hour ago, salgare said:

The Church obviously supports their teaching Nuanced Mormonism as it allows them to use their Chapels and have never called them to a court of love for extensive public teaching of what the first two patterns above might well consider apostasy (i.e. a non-historical BoM).

 

CFR that anyone giving Chapel firesides has so much as intimated the Book of Mormon might not be historical.

[Robert F. Smith]

1 hour ago, salgare said:

Do you agree that its reputation was such by outsiders?

No.  There were some rabid anti-Mormons who made some negative comments in the past decade, but FARMS was always a very quiet and well-behaved private organization from the year of its founding in California in 1979.  There were no ad hominems.

For example, IMO, the final straw from GA's for Dan was the times magazine photo incident where he went ballistic on the photographer for his photo gallery of seemingly unhappy Mormons in Happy Valley.

Never heard of such an incident (perhaps you can cite a source), and no General Authorities were ever involved with the firings at the Maxwell Institute.  By that time, there was really no more FARMS anyhow.  It had become part of BYU, and was subsumed under other specialized entities.  Pres Hinckley and Elder Neal A. Mawell liked what FARMS did, and said so.  That is why FARMS was assimilated to BYU, despite my and other members objections.

Dan Peterson, a professor of Arabic and Middle East studies at BYU, served without pay as editor of FARMS Review for 23 years, directed the Middle Eastern Texts Initiative at the Maxwell Institute, and did extensive fund-raising for the Institute -- aside from being FARMS Board President at one point.  I have known Dan for many years.  He is all smiles and doesn't have an angry bone in his body.

 

[salgare]

1 hour ago, Kevin Christensen said:

Reputation and reality are not necessarily the same thing. Hence my post. 

If I want to call myself a scholar, I ought to know the difference.  The decision to fire Daniel Peterson in 2012 was made by Gerald Bradford who is not a GA.  Speculation without evidence of GA involvement is just that.   And there seems to have been no move to fire Peterson from BYU, nor to discourage him from speaking publicly, blogging regularly, publishing regular essays in the Desert News, and for continuing 18 volumes (and counting) of the Interpreter, and participating at FAIRMormon.

FWIW

Kevin Christensen

Canonsburg, PA

One bad apple spoils the whole bunch they say.  I wonder how many of you 300 were ever embarrassed by Dan or Bill.  I do know that FAIRMormon was be very proactive on trying to cleanup this bad reputation.  Could someone fill me in on the fairly recent name change, I did not even realize it until a couple months when I as chastised here for referring to them as FAIR.  Why the change.  I was somewhat surprised to see Dan at the top still, after some kind of reorgination, seeming how he is one of the major players in your bad rep.  I guess the good news is that he has mostly fallen from the lime light of at least the MDB board.

[Daniel Peterson]

The myth grew rapidly and continues to be passed on.

 

But here's the truth:

 

To the best of my knowledge, there was no General Authority involvement in my expulsion from the Maxwell Institute.  I've seen no evidence suggesting that there was, and I have very strong evidence -- it would be difficult to imagine STRONGER evidence -- that there wasn't, but that, instead, very high-ranking Church leaders in Salt Lake City learned about the matter from news reports and were surprised by it.

 

As to the legend of my going "ballistic" with reference to a Time photographic essay:  Simply not true.  I didn't go ballistic.  (I'm a Type B personality; I don't go ballistic.)  I know that the story has been told, and that I'm falsely portrayed in it -- what's new? -- but it's false.  And I've heard nothing, ever, to suggest that the incident had even the slightest connection with the Maxwell Institute purge.

 

Incidentally, I'm still on good terms with the Brethren.  And, if I weren't, I can promise you that I wouldn't still be writing a weekly column (and co-writing another, biweekly, column) in the Church's newspaper.

 

The phony stories about me are pretty tiresome, but I feel that I should spike them whenever possible, so that they don't become the historical record.

 

 

[Robert F. Smith]

2 hours ago, salgare said:

Steve,

I'm very interested in if other Christian Apologetics follow similar patterns as to those of Mormon apologists.

What might also interest you is poking around into the history of Mormon Apologetics which is relatively young/new, starting with Hugh Nibley being considered by most as the Father of Mormon Apologetics.

Actually, Mormon apologetics began with Orson Pratt and B. H. Roberts.  It continued with Sidney Sperry (grad Univ of Chicago in Hebrew), and then Hugh Nibley and John L. Sorenson.  Jack Welch formed FARMS in California in 1979, and brought it to Provo  the following year when he joined the faculty at BYU.  Some Nibleyphiles got involved with FARMS along the way, but it was always a loose knit group of professors from various disciplines.

................................................................  There is a recent history (what 5 years back?) of their getting booted out of the Maxwell Institute, for reasons that have a fascinating and super heated history of its own (remember John Dehlin in this regard, another fascinating history to follow).

John Dehlin heard that an article about him was soon to appear in FARMS Review.  He had not read it, but claimed it was a "hit piece," which it was not, and sought to prevent publication (censorship). 

Some critics referred to this group as "The old Guard" which was replaced with "The new Guard" of which the old guard utilized all of their old ad hominem against the new guard and BYU for firing them and clearing them out.  These went on for several years after the firing.  A portion of these attacks were over accusations that the new guard were following some of the Nuanced Mormons and did not believe in the historicity of the BoM. Critics believe that the Church needed gentler apologitics and heavily influenced the firiing.     This is the first "pattern" I would like to ask about.

Completely false version of what happened, but it does comport with the anti-Mormon ranting and fuming about the matter.

A gentler generation of potential apologist were evolving out of a Professor at (someone please help with name) in California named Richard Lyman Bushman, author of Rough Stone Rolling.  This was the first real appearance of transparency as Richard was not excommunicated for publishing a book that others had been excommunicated for revealing.  A few of the younger men that come from those studies and have posted about found the ad hominem ways of the old guard to be very undesirable and they tend to reflect just about 180 degree opposites in their demeanor with others.  This is the second pattern.

The third pattern is Terryl Givens and his wife.  These are the Nuanced Mormons.

Dan Peterson, Richard Bushman, and Terryl Givens are merely three of a plethora of well-known Mormon scholars, all of whom are friends, and none of whom has ever been in danger of excommunication (where do you get this crazy stuff, salgare?).  Bushman is a retired professor of American History from Columbia Univ., has since held the Howard Hunter Chair in Mormon Studies at the Claremont Graduate Univ., and was for a long time a stake patriarch.  He is highly regarded by virtually all Mormon scholars, as well as by the Brethren.  Always has been.

The Church has no official apologetic and the critics have suggested that the above patterns have actually driven/changed doctrine and Church policy, as most of the General Authorities of even 15 years ago had little knowledge and understanding of the history and doctrinal issues.

Of course none of these groups claim to represent the Church, and yet it is obvious (to critics at least) that the Church supports these efforts as they are the ones writing the books, doing the various private organization conventions, working these sites etc.  They are what Joe Public who investigates will see.  They are the intellectuals and scholars whom the GA's turn to for advice etc.

It's this third pattern that is of great interest to me.  They travel the country doing "firesides" (present talks/preach in Church owned Chapels) directed at members with doubts.  Those who have been off put with the likes of pattern one, generated doubts that are crashing their shelves based on pattern two, are presented with pattern three, the option that Humanism is where its at, make it whatever works for you, no need for orthodoxy or doctrines or God for that matter.

The Church obviously supports their teaching Nuanced Mormonism as it allows them to use their Chapels and have never called them to a court of love for extensive public teaching of what the first two patterns above might well consider apostasy (i.e. a non-historical BoM).

I'm interested to know if these kinds of shenanigans are common among other Christian communities, where not only do the critics need to be handled publicly, but internal member losses call for other unofficial apologetics focused at active members. 

While it is true that the LDS Church has no official apologetic style or content, it is not true that the LDS Church supports the work of what you call "Nuanced Mormons."   Do you have a source from which you have obtained this folderol?

 

[Russell C McGregor]

58 minutes ago, salgare said:

John has known contacts as well and I believe him.  But I don't want to derail too soon, I'm wondering with the falloff of interest in organized religion in general what apologetics might be like and if it is also changing in other organizations

 

Sal, you are spreading gossip in defiance of first-hand testimony.

It is malicious.

Stop it.

 

[salgare]

15 minutes ago, cinepro said:

CFR that anyone giving Chapel firesides has so much as intimated the Book of Mormon might not be historical.

I don't think that has happened in direct words, however the general message of "do what works for you" leaves that wide open.  IMO, this is the king pin of any potential total switch from holding onto orthodoxy/doctrine and opening the tent size up to larger than any NOM could dream for (humanistic atheist as welcome as any, well except gays of course).  The finger pointing and public cries of apostasy against the new guard is/was a scary thing.  With the honor code careers are at stake, memberships are at stake.  Who is going to be the brave soul/group that crosses this line, stands up is Fast and Test. and declares their true believes.

My gut feeling tells me the whole firing had a foundation in the scholars needing to professionally start taking this stand as they get totally clobber in public and professional realms as we say happen with Bill Hamblin.  Wow what an embarrassment.   No Professional at BYU wants to say they support Ancient BoM Studies, as we all found all following along with Bill's debacle there is no such thing.

When the Church's tent becomes large enough for public acceptance of non-historical BoM I wonder how many of the likes of Scott and Kevin will be able to shelf that one.  I think its a matter of the Church timing it right, but for now, like we saw this last conference, the pulpit still cries out to fear the wolfs clothed in sheep's clothing ... tough diverse crowd to play to.  Seems they are holding steady on the correlated group with a bone thrown this time to the old schoolers.

[USU78]

2 hours ago, Kevin Christensen said:

Uhmm... I have actually read every volume of the FARMS Review over the 23 years in question (and much more from FARMS), and am one of the over 300 different individuals who contributed to that publication, and therefore consider myself informed enough to question the characterization of FARMS as "very ad hominem based."

I also know what is and is not ad hominem, which is not always true of those who toss the accusation at FARMS.

http://en.fairmormon.org/Mormonism_and_apologetics/%22ad_hominem%22

FWIW

Kevin Christensen

Canonsburg, PA

How delicious the irony of employing ad hominem to discredit somebody for employing [allegedly] ad hominem!

[juliann]

Oh for HEAVENS SAKE. That has to be the most inaccurate account of "Mormon apologetics" ever presented on this board, Salgare. I can say that because I've been there for 20 years. 

You show little awareness of much of anything other than some apparent anger at a few people that has little to do with what is going on today. Seriously, take the hate somewhere else.

 

[juliann]

55 minutes ago, salgare said:

One bad apple spoils the whole bunch they say.  I wonder how many of you 300 were ever embarrassed by Dan or Bill.  I do know that FAIRMormon was be very proactive on trying to cleanup this bad reputation.  Could someone fill me in on the fairly recent name change, I did not even realize it until a couple months when I as chastised here for referring to them as FAIR.  Why the change.  I was somewhat surprised to see Dan at the top still, after some kind of reorgination, seeming how he is one of the major players in your bad rep.  I guess the good news is that he has mostly fallen from the lime light of at least the MDB board.

Please fill me on on our proactive clean-up. Don't omit the details.

If you demonstrate even rudimentary civility and any good will at all I would be happy to answer your questions about FM.

Edited April 7, 2016 by juliann

[salgare]

1 hour ago, cinepro said:

Not being a saint today I see.

[Calm]

 

1 hour ago, salgare said:

.  I do know that FAIRMormon was be very proactive on trying to cleanup this bad reputation.

It would be interesting to learn how you know this, what we did proactively, and what specific bad reputation you are talking about (to be sure we are talking about the same thing in regards to any action taken by us).