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Bill Hamblin has put together his thoughts on the future of Mormon Studies "without rose-colored glasses" (the pdf is available here: http://mormonscriptureexplorations.files.wordpress.com/2012/07/mormon-studies.pdf and the MD&D disucssion thread is here: http://www.mormondialogue.org/topic/58506-mormon-studies-without-the-rose-colored-glasses/).

Although Hamblin does not say who he is arguing against, my sense is that when he refers to a "rose-colored" view of Mormon Studies, he is probably referring to what Richard Bushman has called the "liberation" of Mormon Studies (see remarks here: http://www.faithandknowledge.org/2007/liberation.pdf).

First of all, Hamblin warns everyone that the type of apologetics championed by DCP, Hamblin, Midgley et al. isn't going anywhere:

Bill Hamblin wrote:We also must note that, despite the fond wishes of many critics, LDS apologetics is not going away. The fact that the director of the Maxwell Institute has decided to no longer allow the Institute or its employees to publish LDS apologetics will, in the long run, not even put a small dent in the effort. At most it may briefly delay the appearance of a few studies. Anyone who thinks LDS apologetics is finished, is, to put it nicely--and I really, really want to be nice--grossly deluded. Mormon apologetics has existed since the founding of the Church, and it will continue to flourish even after Dan Peterson is dead--may that day be far from us! So, don’t expect your friendly neighborhood apologist to be silenced by inept bureaucratic decree any time soon.

I love that Bill says that he wants to be nice and then proceeds to call Jerry Bradford an inept bureaucrat.

Then Bill brags about how many books he has read on Hinduism and Religious Studies in general, but then argues that any study of religion from a naturalistic viewpoint is like studying Beethoven without listening to his music:

Bill Hamblin wrote:For if God really does exist, and really does intervene in history, and really is the ultimate cause of religion, then removing God from the discussion means that everything religious studies has to say about religion is at best warped and twisted, and at worst, fundamentally misguided and wrong.

So only believing Mormons are qualified to engage in Mormon studes:

Bill Hamblin wrote:Unfortunately, religious studies scholars in general, and Mormon studies specifically, regularly fail to do this. Their works too often leave the believer puzzled, wondering how there could be another religion called Mormonism which is so fundamentally different from the religion the believer knows and practices and loves. While non-Mormons can certainly study Mormonism and offer whatever insights they may have, we as Mormons would be very unwise to allow ourselves to be defined by the assumptions and dictates of Mormon studies.

Chris/Bridget: according to Bill, you guys are clearly wasting your time in studying Mormonism (and given how Hamblin treated Chris recently on MD&D, I would bet he truly believes that).

And what is the other "fatal flaw" of Religious Studies? Why feminism, of course. To be fair, Hamblin refers more broadly to the evils of "political correctness run amok" but this is the example he gives:

Bill Hamblin wrote:People who are not professional religious studies scholars would undoubtedly be shocked to find the magnitude of sheer nincompoopery that passes itself off as serious academic scholarship at the annual national meeting of the American Academy of Religion. It’s really breathtaking to watch political correctness run amok in the academy. (My favorite example was a session on “Eco-feminism, food and pets.” I’m not making this up.)

So according to Bill, the only people qualified to engage in Mormon Studies are believing Mormons disgusted with the "nincompoopery" of political correctness . . . in other words, people just like Bill!

Bill then predicts that there will not be any money to support Mormon studies:

Bill Hamblin wrote:I also doubt that any serious university support for Mormon studies will be forthcoming anytime in the near future. This is in part due to the recession, and in part do to the rising costs of universities, which are greatly outpacing inflation. Universities simply don’t have the funding or the will to create such new specialized programs. The national trend in academia is in fact to shut down such specialized programs and shift their resources towards high enrollment general education and major classes, not to create new expensive special programs with limited appeal.

Well Bill, given your glowing assesment of the qualities of Religious Studies, I can see why so many wealthy TBMs are just lining up to fund it. I am also sure that no academic institution unaffiliated with the Church is going to spend money to fund "Mormon studies" with as narrow a definition as Bill wants to hang on it.

All Bill has shown me is his unremitting capacity to come off like a mean-spirited, narrow-minded idiot.

I hear he is a much better person than this, and I trust my friends who tell me this is true.

Unfortunately, his apologetics mightily challenge my belief in the possibility.

Cicero wrote:

Bill Hamblin wrote:We also must note that, despite the fond wishes of many critics, LDS apologetics is not going away.

But that isn't the fondest wish of many critics. The fondest wish of many critics is that the kind of Moplogetics Hamblin represents becomes the public face of the LDS Church. The writings of jihadis like Bill Hamblin are the best resource available for anyone looking to de-convert people from Mormonism.

You know, it suddenly strikes me how any intellectual endeavor must strike one as hollow if it is not undergirded by an abiding faith in the God of Israel. What Bill says must be universally true.

I should ignore the fact that many stunning discoveries have been made without a firm conviction of the existence of the God of Israel, and that one can learn a lot about history, culture, and politics by studying religions without believing in them, or believing in Jesus or Yaweh in particular.

To think such is clearly idiocy.

I have not heard such mighty wisdom since Julian the Apostate banned Christians from the teaching of the Classics on the grounds that they did not believe in the Hellenic gods in the late fourth century AD.

Well do I know the futility of studying the Classics without believing in Zeus. If only I could acquire such a testimony, my life would be complete.

My favorite part is where Hamblin says that the fact the director of the Maxwell Institute has decided to no longer allow the Institute or its employees to publish LDS apologetics will, in the long run, not even put a small dent in the effort.

If this is the case, why all of Hamblin's weeping and wailing and gnashing of teeth these past two months? Why all the pity parties and trash talking on the MI if it won't put a dent in apologetic effort? If its no big deal Bill, quit yer bitchin' and move on with your life.

Why is it that people who leave the MI can't leave the MI alone?

Racer wrote:My favorite part is where Hamblin says that the fact the director of the Maxwell Institute has decided to no longer allow the Institute or its employees to publish LDS apologetics will, in the long run, not even put a small dent in the effort.

I don't think that is even true. I think what Bradford decided is that he no longer wanted unmitigated assholery perpetrated in the guise of apologetics.

Racer wrote:Why is it that people who leave the MI can't leave the MI alone?

Win!

I know I'm an elect lady and I am very hesitant to say this but.... what the hell.

Bill Hamblin is one of those rare human beings who possesses a triune quality much like that described by the early Christian creeds.

Bill Hamblin is at once fully human, fully idiot, and fully asshat.

And people say Mormons don't believe in trinity.

Emma Smith wrote:I know I'm an elect lady and I am very hesitant to say this but.... what the hell.

Bill Hamblin is one of those rare human beings who possesses a triune quality much like that described by the early Christian creeds.

Bill Hamblin is at once fully human, fully idiot, and fully asshat.

And people say Mormons don't believe in trinity.

And another win!

What exactly is Hamblin arguing against? He can't possibly be arguing against scholarship written by LDS, right? Because that would mean that he's attacking Richard Bushman, Terryl Givens, etc. These guys, after all, can be considered "apologists" because their material does indeed "defend" the Church.

Ultimately, I think that Hamblin is saying (in his rather circumspect way) that aggressive, polemical, ad hominem-laced Mopologetics will continue. He seems to be suggesting/saying that religious studies lacks "legit" scholarship, which is kind of a weird charge considering things like "Their Own Corner of Cyberspace" and "Metcalfe is Butthead." Furthermore, the Review was always meant to be, well, a review, and most people realize that there are rather clear differences between book reviews and scholarship per se. His comment re: financing, once again, appears to be saying that no one will want to pay for LDS apologetics that isn't bristling with hostility and mean-spiritedness.

The last thing I'll add here is that I have good reason to believe that the hardcore, Old Guard Mopologists really hate Richard Bushman. I was told this by an "informant"--i.e., that they were royally pissed off at him (Midgley in particular) in the wake of last year's Gold Plates seminer--they were angry that he was friendly to "hardcore apostates and anti-Mormons" like Mike Reed and Chris Smith. Perhaps the best evidence for the truth of these sentiments can be found in the slip-ups of their biggest loud-mouth, Will Schryver, who was openly bashing Rough Stone Rolling not all that long ago.