An Other Testament: On Typology by Joseph M. Spencer

[tagriffy]

But I do not see how you are relating historical questions about the Book of Mormon to this kind of modern clarifying of historical accounts.

I am apparently missing something, then. Please clarify.

[huckelberry]

But I do not see how you are relating historical questions about the Book of Mormon to this kind of modern clarifying of historical accounts.

I am apparently missing something, then. Please clarify.

Tagriffy, I find the subject and thought you presented interesting and hoped to further the discussion. I am perhaps stumbling around a bit in that endeavor I hope avoiding offense.

Lets try, Joseph receives this story either by way of plates or the muse of his inspiration and tells it without engaging in any modern critical historical analysis. He would not have much material to do that with even if he wished. So the story comes into existence and is a fact from that point on. A reader may find inspiration for thought in the various turns of plot. A reader is also presented with the questions about the role this book has in establishing Joseph's one true form of Christianity. Is the book clear proof that Jesus rose from the dead and visited the Americas? It is hard not to care about these questions. I suppose an I don't know may stand and a person choose a relationship to the LDS church on other basis.

Myself if I am considering inspired Christian fiction I am more attracted to George Mcdonald. He does not have a church but CS Lewis thought of him as instructor.

[huckelberry]

Tagriffy, I noticed this morning that I missed reading your post previous to the one I replied to wherein you explained what you were thinking more completely. It included a link to your personal history regarding faith.It helps me understand what you are thinking better , I hope. Thanks.Maybe I find myself agreeing with you in thinking the idea of myth can touch a sense of realities that are uncertain in the realm of historical analysis.

I cannot remember a time when I thought the Bible was inerrant. It seems clearly written from the vantage point of people limited knowledge and understanding. The exodus is a myth of calling and then following to discover God and the spiritual dimension of human relationships. I think that what ever the historical germ of the story was it is presented as an invitation to join the journey.

[huckelberry]

Yeah, like the Bible, essentially. I applaud what Spencer is doing because it is probably necessary and it doubtless takes a lot of talent and hard work to achieve, but he is basically saying that the Book of Mormon is like the Bible. The Bible is not history. Myth, symbol, and typological elements override any connection with the historical elements. Honestly, it is not enough to say there was a guy named Jesus. The guy named Jesus probably did not live the life that is constructed in four distinctive narratives in the New Testament.

If people were not so ignorant of the actual nature of the Bible, they would have a lot less trouble with the mythological nature of the Book of Mormon. And myth is a wonderful way of putting it. Unfortunately it no longer works for people who too easily equate myth with “lie” or “fiction.” Also, Spencer is looking for a way out of a stale debate about historicity that is going nowhere. Again, some literary knowledge would help (the members, not Spencer, who is already more than well enough informed). Joseph Smith called it a history, but he did not use the term in the technical sense, most likely because he had no real understanding of the technical sense of the word. For Smith, history evidently meant something like, “instructive story about the past” into which category one might place the myths of Genesis or stories about George Washington. So why not a history of the Nephites, Lamanites, and Jaredites?

And now, we have the book "Method Infinite" which has demonstrated Joseph Smith was the same way in his approach to the Masonic ideas of their own legends and stories. There was a "literalization" of the history of the legends, yet there is not a history there at all. This is most interesting and an avenue I am pursuing... actually, if one wants to see what the "literal" history of ancient Israel in the Bible was, William G. Dever is really strong in that area, and yet, Israelite history, not as the Bible portrays, but as archaeology has discovered, an actual Israel, but the legendary stuff in the Bible tells us more about what it meant to people than the actual dirt and bone archaeology ever will. It is an interesting arena to be sure.

Philo, I was struck by your final comments here, accurate and valuable. I was thinking today that my mind has been shifting back and forth on how to see the exodus story. I have long long thought that the story we read is a much expanded image of some event which has been retold as if all Israel participated so that it is an invitation for all now to participate. Devers book makes much more concrete the distance between story and events. He allows there may well have been some group from Egypt but not large enough to make an archeological physical mark. the People who became Israel were the Canaanites. logical and in some ways a reassurance for rejecting the conquest genocide story. I am also reflecting on a book you considered in the past, "The Origins of Biblical Monotheism"by Mark Smith. He makes clear the ongoing influence of the Canaanite understanding about God showing the what people later thought grew out of that Canaanite soil. In some ways a valuable book but one that left me puzzling why no exploration of what was driving the change. Why did these people not all remain comfortably Canaanite?

Of course that is the same question I find myself asking of Dever. He treats the emerging Israelite faith as a project of some literary elite. Sure there could be something to that but how in the world they take over the cultural thinking so broadly and what motivated them in the first place?

Well Philo, as you noted, the Bible does have a picture of what these people were thinking. It may be communicated in part by images and augmented stories but something of what was really experienced by those people may be( must be?) contained in that Exodus story.

////////
"The guy named Jesus probably did not live the life that is constructed in four distinctive narratives in the New Testament."

I wonder what this may mean. He actually played baseball for the Yankees? I think normally we are speaking of that fellow who preached in the countryside of Judea inspired people and was executed by Roman soldiers.I can understand saying that the details of his preaching activities likely did not all proceed just as reported. In fact I can image there is a sort of fictional narrative which has been created to hang bits and pieces of tradition upon. I think that it is fair to say that the intention is to create an image of what really happened and what was important to his followers though fiction is a real ingredient in the picture's construction.

[tagriffy]

Tagriffy, I noticed this morning that I missed reading your post previous to the one I replied to wherein you explained what you were thinking more completely. It included a link to your personal history regarding faith.It helps me understand what you are thinking better , I hope. Thanks.Maybe I find myself agreeing with you in thinking the idea of myth can touch a sense of realities that are uncertain in the realm of historical analysis.

I cannot remember a time when I thought the Bible was inerrant. It seems clearly written from the vantage point of people limited knowledge and understanding. The exodus is a myth of calling and then following to discover God and the spiritual dimension of human relationships. I think that what ever the historical germ of the story was it is presented as an invitation to join the journey.

First, I apologize for taking so long to respond. It's been a weird week.

Second, to clarify, does this mean you don't need a specific response to your pot of 1935 2 Dec 2022?

My acceptance of biblical inerrancy was largely due to the relative lack of resources. Nearly all the Protestant churches in my area are Evangelical/Fundamentalist. ALL the Christian bookstores I have ever been in sell Evangelical/Fundamentalist material almost exclusively. Most of my exposure to modern historical-critical methodology came from apologetics against said methodology. So on and so forth. I simply had nothing else to work with until I started systematically reading every book in the library on religion. And I mean that literally. The book that created the real crack for me was Is God a Creationist. Thereafter, I was able to find more and better material.

[huckelberry]

Tagriffy, I noticed this morning that I missed reading your post previous to the one I replied to wherein you explained what you were thinking more completely. It included a link to your personal history regarding faith.It helps me understand what you are thinking better , I hope. Thanks.Maybe I find myself agreeing with you in thinking the idea of myth can touch a sense of realities that are uncertain in the realm of historical analysis.

I cannot remember a time when I thought the Bible was inerrant. It seems clearly written from the vantage point of people limited knowledge and understanding. The exodus is a myth of calling and then following to discover God and the spiritual dimension of human relationships. I think that what ever the historical germ of the story was it is presented as an invitation to join the journey.

First, I apologize for taking so long to respond. It's been a weird week.

Second, to clarify, does this mean you don't need a specific response to your pot of 1935 2 Dec 2022?

My acceptance of biblical inerrancy was largely due to the relative lack of resources. Nearly all the Protestant churches in my area are Evangelical/Fundamentalist. ALL the Christian bookstores I have ever been in sell Evangelical/Fundamentalist material almost exclusively. Most of my exposure to modern historical-critical methodology came from apologetics against said methodology. So on and so forth. I simply had nothing else to work with until I started systematically reading every book in the library on religion. And I mean that literally. The book that created the real crack for me was Is God a Creationist. Thereafter, I was able to find more and better material.

Tagriffy, I appreciate your comments. You should not feel obligated to reply further to my questions unless you wish.
My experience does not include being surrounded by pressure to assume inerrancy for the Bible. I can see that a lot of pressure exists and perhaps just a climate of unquestioned assumption. I recall Frankie Schaeffer commenting about his father, who was a thoughtful preacher , that he simply did not question inerrancy and did not spend time defending or explaining it.

I think seeing Genesis as unscientific stories designed to point out large themes of human experience is fairly easy. I was interested in science geology, evolution so those shaped how I thought of Genesis. I find, as I noted above, more difficulty deciding how to relate to exodus. But whatever the history history exodus is a story without which the Bible would make little sense.