Harassment and Hypocrisy: The Robert Boylan Experience

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MsJack
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Re: Harassment and Hypocrisy: The Robert Boylan Experience

Post by MsJack »

Bill_Billiams wrote:
Thu Jun 01, 2023 10:40 pm
He seems to have an obsession with income and the death of people he doesn’t like. Imagine celebrating that a theologian you don't like died 400+ years ago.
Screenshot_20230601_152912_Chrome.jpg
As I understand it, he died with quite a lot more written than some self-published screeds and a book review.

Also, people actually read his books. He didn't have to review them himself.
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Re: Harassment and Hypocrisy: The Robert Boylan Experience

Post by Moksha »

Bill_Billiams wrote:
Thu Jun 01, 2023 4:08 pm
Bizarrely, he does leave 5 star reviews on his own books on Amazon. Here is an example: https://www.amazon.com/After-Order-Son- ... eature_div

This just further highlights what a strange person he is.
By leaving his own reviews, he is assured of at least one 5-star review.



How do you think Boylan would fair in a cage match with other young Mormon apologists when battling for the Dan Peterson succession crown?
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Re: Harassment and Hypocrisy: The Robert Boylan Experience

Post by malkie »

MsJack wrote:
Fri Jun 02, 2023 1:42 am
Bill_Billiams wrote:
Thu Jun 01, 2023 10:40 pm
He seems to have an obsession with income and the death of people he doesn’t like. Imagine celebrating that a theologian you don't like died 400+ years ago.
Screenshot_20230601_152912_Chrome.jpg
As I understand it, he died with quite a lot more written than some self-published screeds and a book review.

Also, people actually read his books. He didn't have to review them himself.
Don't judge him yet, MsJack - who knows how famous and respected Boylan might be in the late 25th C, right?
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Re: Harassment and Hypocrisy: The Robert Boylan Experience

Post by Bill_Billiams »

MsJack wrote:
Fri Jun 02, 2023 1:42 am
Bill_Billiams wrote:
Thu Jun 01, 2023 10:40 pm
He seems to have an obsession with income and the death of people he doesn’t like. Imagine celebrating that a theologian you don't like died 400+ years ago.
Screenshot_20230601_152912_Chrome.jpg
As I understand it, he died with quite a lot more written than some self-published screeds and a book review.

Also, people actually read his books. He didn't have to review them himself.
John Calvin is probably the most influential reformer behind Luther. Boylan is really going to have to step his game up if he wants to exceed the influence of Calvin.
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Re: Harassment and Hypocrisy: The Robert Boylan Experience

Post by Bill_Billiams »

Moksha wrote:
Fri Jun 02, 2023 2:19 am
Bill_Billiams wrote:
Thu Jun 01, 2023 4:08 pm
Bizarrely, he does leave 5 star reviews on his own books on Amazon. Here is an example: https://www.amazon.com/After-Order-Son- ... eature_div

This just further highlights what a strange person he is.
By leaving his own reviews, he is assured of at least one 5-star review.

How do you think Boylan would fair in a cage match with other young Mormon apologists when battling for the Dan Peterson succession crown?
If it is a real cage match he wouldn't last long.
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Re: Harassment and Hypocrisy: The Robert Boylan Experience

Post by MsJack »

Bill_Billiams wrote:
Fri Jun 02, 2023 1:50 pm
John Calvin is probably the most influential reformer behind Luther. Boylan is really going to have to step his game up if he wants to exceed the influence of Calvin.
For sure. And he only lived to be 54 years old. Luther made it to 62.

A critic once tried to mock Calvin for having no surviving children and he replied something like, "I have children all over the world."

There is a wall in Geneva with statues of Calvinist Reformers on it: Calvin, Beza, Knox, and William Farel in the center. On their left are other Reformers. On their right are Oliver Cromwell, Roger Williams, and Stephen Bocskai. The inclusion of Cromwell and Williams makes the subtle argument that Calvinist thought eventually led to democracy and freedom of religion (though no legitimate historian would ever say Calvin was pro-democracy or pro-freedom-of-religion himself).

Little-known fact: Calvin was also the father of the modern divorce, "modern" in the sense that one party was not executed to free the other party from the marriage and the non-offending party was allowed to re-marry. The Protestant Reformers saw that the medieval system of no-divorces-ever-unless-your-spouse-is-dead (and if you did get one, you couldn't re-marry unless your ex died) was too harsh and unfeasible. Geneva was among the first localities to begin very reluctantly granting divorces for adultery, and they did not always execute the offending party. Calvin's own brother was granted a divorce (though, in my opinion, Calvin's sister-in-law was falsely accused, and she re-married outside of Geneva).

I am not Calvinist, but I think it is incredibly important for historians to give theologians of the past credit where due, even when we disagree with them. And we owe Calvin a lot, whether we like him or not.
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Re: Harassment and Hypocrisy: The Robert Boylan Experience

Post by Bill_Billiams »

MsJack wrote:
Fri Jun 02, 2023 2:42 pm
Bill_Billiams wrote:
Fri Jun 02, 2023 1:50 pm
John Calvin is probably the most influential reformer behind Luther. Boylan is really going to have to step his game up if he wants to exceed the influence of Calvin.
For sure. And he only lived to be 54 years old. Luther made it to 62.

A critic once tried to mock Calvin for having no surviving children and he replied something like, "I have children all over the world."

There is a wall in Geneva with statues of Calvinist Reformers on it: Calvin, Beza, Knox, and William Farel in the center. On their left are other Reformers. On their right are Oliver Cromwell, Roger Williams, and Stephen Bocskai. The inclusion of Cromwell and Williams makes the subtle argument that Calvinist thought eventually led to democracy and freedom of religion (though no legitimate historian would ever say Calvin was pro-democracy or pro-freedom-of-religion himself).

Little-known fact: Calvin was also the father of the modern divorce, "modern" in the sense that one party was not executed to free the other party from the marriage and the non-offending party was allowed to re-marry. The Protestant Reformers saw that the medieval system of no-divorces-ever-unless-your-spouse-is-dead (and if you did get one, you couldn't re-marry unless your ex died) was too harsh and unfeasible. Geneva was among the first localities to begin very reluctantly granting divorces for adultery, and they did not always execute the offending party. Calvin's own brother was granted a divorce (though, in my opinion, Calvin's sister-in-law was falsely accused, and she re-married outside of Geneva).

I am not Calvinist, but I think it is incredibly important for historians to give theologians of the past credit where due, even when we disagree with them. And we owe Calvin a lot, whether we like him or not.
I agree completely. There are plenty of things I don't like about Calvin. But one has to respect or at least acknowledge his place in history and effect on the modern world.
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Re: Harassment and Hypocrisy: The Robert Boylan Experience

Post by Moksha »

MsJack wrote:
Fri Jun 02, 2023 2:42 pm
Bill_Billiams wrote:
Fri Jun 02, 2023 1:50 pm
John Calvin is probably the most influential reformer behind Luther. Boylan is really going to have to step his game up if he wants to exceed the influence of Calvin.
For sure. And he only lived to be 54 years old. Luther made it to 62.
Yes, but... Among the world's 4 million active Mormons, the name Boylan, along with Alma, is repeated with great frequency during Church services. They ask questions like, "What would Boylan do?" and even refer to him affectionately as Tapir Boylan. So it is not grandiose narcissism that causes him to ponder his future legacy. Even now, toting a Bowie knife by members is seen as a sign of respect to both Robert Boylan and Brigham Young.
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Re: Harassment and Hypocrisy: The Robert Boylan Experience

Post by Tom »

MsJack wrote:
Thu Jun 01, 2023 3:54 pm
drumdude wrote:
Thu Jun 01, 2023 3:08 pm
Does Boylan think he is leaving behind some lasting mark on the world?
A search for his name in ATLA / EBSCO revealed one result, a 2010 "book review" of Ross Anderson's book on the Book of Mormon for FARMS:

Image

Searching simply "Boylan, Robert" brings up a bunch of people in other fields whom I'm fairly certain are not him, so I tried searching under "Mormon," "theology," "patristics," "apologetics," "history of biblical interpretation," and "Bible." Nothing except the book review under "Mormon."

ATLA / EBSCO is full of errors and its indexing is imperfect, so it's possible he's written academic things that aren't on there, but so far it's caught everything I've published in an actual journal or book. Even the things that I wrote under my ex-husband's last name show up under a search for "Jeffries, Bridget."

I have nothing against self-publishing or blogging, by the way, but if people aren't actually discussing and reviewing your self-published works in academic journals, then your writing probably isn't having much of an impact.
I assume that ATLA/EBSCO doesn't include Interpreter. (He's published a book review and a brief article in Interpreter.)
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Re: Harassment and Hypocrisy: The Robert Boylan Experience

Post by MsJack »

Tom wrote:
Fri Jun 02, 2023 6:02 pm
I assume that ATLA/EBSCO doesn't include Interpreter. (He's published a book review and a brief article in Interpreter.)
It does not, and I did take a peek at Interpreter before I did my post, but decided not to mention it.

I've got nothing against writing things for Interpreter, but there are plenty of peer-reviewed places for serious Mormon thinkers to publish. I don't usually count my articles for e-zines under my writing credentials, either, except for the ones that were well-read and well-received.
Last edited by MsJack on Fri Jun 02, 2023 6:53 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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