Apostle/Scientist/Educator Joseph F Merrill

[Calm]

Came across this when posting the interview link for the new Evolution book.

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He saw no trouble in using the scientific method to understand religious experience.

After one particularly important spiritual experience in his life, he even wrote up a full physiological report on how his body reacted during this revelatory episode and sent it to the Physical Research Society of Boston for analysis! He just saw no conflict between faith and reason.

Not what one usually expects from an apostle.   
 

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He saw scientific method as another avenue for revelation, in this case, a way to see the wonders of the universe. He taught that scientific intuition, inspiration, and revelation were all just aspects of the same phenomenon.

I think I would very much enjoy talking with Brother Merrill.  I see things the same way more or less.

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It seems like Merrill was focused on using the beauty, wonder, and organization of the universe as proof of the divine. Rather than looking downward, he wanted us to look outward at the universe around us and appreciate the organization and structure in the way things work.

The book that led to the interview:

https://fairlatterdaysaints.org/store/product/truth-seeker-the-life-of-joseph-f-merrill-scientist-educator-and-apostle/
 

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Casey P. Griffiths:  Truth Seeker: The Life of Joseph F. Merrill, Scientist, Educator, and Apostle

Joseph F. Merrill became the first native Utahn to earn a PhD. Working at the University of Utah, he labored to reconcile the secular world with the spiritual world of his youth. In 1912 he helped establish the first Latter-day Saint seminary at Granite High School. As Church commissioner of education, he helped establish the institutes of religion, with a mission to allow college students to reconcile the secular truths learned in university settings with the truths of the gospel. He created the Religion Department at Brigham Young University and encouraged young scholars to produce professional studies of the Latter-day Saint religion. In 1933 Merrill was called as an Apostle, and in that role he continued his work to modernize the Church. In the final years of his life, Merrill continued to work to show that science and religion could be reconciled.

Wikipedia has a lot more on his more secular career.  Looks like his own training was physics and chemistry, though he quickly got into administration.  He may be  one of the main reasons BYU still exists as a church school when almost all the rest of church schools were handed off to the state (Ricks wasn’t wanted apparently so stayed in the Church’s hands as a junior college).  

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joseph_F._Merrill

Edited May 10 by Calm