Encyclopedia of Early Mormon Exegesis
As has often been discussed on BCC, Joseph Smith and the early Mormons interacted with the Bible in exciting and sometimes mysterious ways. Philip Barlow has elegantly described the evolution of Mormon interactions with the Bible, and a variety of sources have provided limited exegetical apparatus for texts, generally for the purpose of establishing as normative a particular interpretation of scripture.
It has occurred to me in the past week or so that a textual compendium of early Mormon exegesis would be quite helpful in teasing apart what early Mormons believed about the world, which was to an enormous extent filtered through the KJV. I envision an electronic database centered on the KJV text which would allow one to search for exegesis by author, time period, canonicity, and similar parameters. Where possible, the actual source would be included for click-through evaluation. I imagine that some kind of approach like that used for the original OED could be useful for generating material quickly. Sources would include early Mormon newspapers, contemporary diaries, tracts/pamphlets, and revelations. Importantly, this would exclude JFiS/BRM and other later commentators and would not be designed to answer “doctrinal” questions but to generate and refine hypotheses, a scholarly rather than a homiletic or dogmatic resource.
Does something like this currently exist? If not, do people think this would be a useful resource? Is there sufficient interest in the Blogdom to generate the required data? Are there platforms people think most useful on the informatics side? Would there be interest in a published version, like Lyndon Cook’s compendia? Is there a graduate student or other aspiring intellect interested in spearheading such a project?
On a more theoretical level, which exegetes should be included and what time periods? Would it be useful to cross-reference to contemporary Protestant resources for a comparative view?
I have no comment on the topic at hand, but just want to say I’m disappointed that the acronym handler isn’t used by all the bloggers yet. I know KJV and OED, but what is JFiS/BRM? Joseph Fielding Smith and Bruce R. McConkie? I think the new acronym thing is wonderful. I hope it gains universal usage.
Comment by Tatiana — January 29, 2007 @ 6:21 pm
Uhhh, wasn’t it here that I just read that? If not, my apologies!
Comment by Tatiana — January 29, 2007 @ 6:23 pm
Tatiana, Sam’s ability to use acronyms outstrips our ability to catalogue them.
Comment by Steve Evans — January 29, 2007 @ 6:25 pm
That would actually be an amazing resource…it would be an insane project (though not ludicrous now because of digitization). Of course we have papers on certain phrases, but such a compendium would be invaluable.
Comment by J. Stapley — January 29, 2007 @ 6:35 pm
I know that it doesn’t address all of your ideas, but I would think that the beta version (including the Journal of Discourses) of scriptures.byu.edu would be a good place to start. They are attempting to catalog all scriptural citations used in every recording conference report and have moved on into the Journal of Discourses. Very handy.
Comment by HP/JDC — January 29, 2007 @ 6:43 pm
Here is a link:
scriptures.byu.edu
Comment by HP/JDC — January 29, 2007 @ 6:44 pm
1: you are correct
5-6: perhaps we shd piggyback on that project. anyone know who’s running the show and whether they’d be interested in something more pre-1850?
3: and here I thought I was using standard abbreviations. you should hear me at work–among ourselves we use an incomprehensible array of abbreviations that may even rival our peers in IT/IS.
ps i agree i like the acronym-handler. (ILTAH?)
Comment by Sam MB — January 29, 2007 @ 7:09 pm
If you all decide that something homegrown would be better, I’d be happy to do DB design, help with writing code (or do it), and host it for as long as I am working for my current company. Just tell me what you want it to do, and I can write it.
Comment by KyleM — January 29, 2007 @ 7:49 pm
thanks, KyleM, will keep in mind. it may be something that people quietly contribute to as they work through material for other purposes.
Comment by Sam MB — January 29, 2007 @ 8:41 pm
HP/JDC is right. If the folks at BYU will cooperate, the best way would be to add the material you are looking for to their project.
I can see the value of what you are proposing, Sam. I sorted the BYU site to get the most cited scripture (Moses 1:39). The difference in how this scripture is valued was shocking. In the Journal of Discourses (covers 1853 to 1885) it was cited just twice. But in the conference reports (1942 to present are included), it is cited 266 times.
Comment by Kent Larsen — January 29, 2007 @ 9:13 pm
I think that the BYU site is splendid and extremely useful; however, I am envisioning something different here. It is one thing to catalog the frequency of say “Ancient of Days” within a specific database. It is quite something else to take the term, give a scholarly exegesis (including how it is translated in newer editions) and then show how the term was used from 1820 to the present (including Diaries, periodicals, tracts, sermons (public and private), FP messages, newspapers, etc.). Such a resource would be invaluable in approaching not only Joseph Smith but the entire restoration. Just think of all the KJV terms that we have steeped in the restoration’s water.
Comment by J. Stapley — January 29, 2007 @ 10:27 pm
Kent, your comment reminds me of the Shepherd/Shepherd book looking at shifts in General Conference themes and is itself quite interesting. My vision of what would make this specifc resource most useful is along the lines proposed by J. in 11 (though the Biblical studies introduction I’m not yet sure about–chewing on risks of offending LDS sensibilities by placing interpretations side by side, how hard to choose the right scholar, the risk of it morphing into some kind of proof-texting, and how quickly it could become dated VERSUS the great utility of having current Biblical studies material right at hand).
Comment by Sam MB — January 29, 2007 @ 10:39 pm
OK, I’ll concede the point on biblical studies…so, Sam, are you going to call Kofford?
Comment by J. Stapley — January 29, 2007 @ 11:23 pm
I’m wondering. Trick is humanpower, given dayjob, new kids, pre-existing culture projects.
Comment by Sam MB — January 29, 2007 @ 11:30 pm
Sam, this is a truly brilliant idea. To have a readily-accessible digest of the variegated multiplicity of Mormon thought about Biblical phrases over time would be outstanding. The concern about offending LDS sensibilities is not necessarily overcome by eliminating Biblical scholarship; many LDS sensibilities are not amenable to the idea that different church leaders might have read the same text in various ways over time. Yet I think this shouldn’t be a concern. It’s impossible to please all of the people all of the time.
Comment by RoastedTomatoes — January 30, 2007 @ 10:00 am
Sam, an excellent idea. Perhaps it could be integrated, at least initially, into (or at least hosted by) the Feast Upon the Word site?
I think it’s wiser not to involve BYU with this kind of project, for all sorts of reasons.
It wouldn’t be difficult to get off the ground; as you mention, the OED comparison is useful: simply invite submissions, which can be sorted and eventually checked for accuracy. (And some books/series–eg by Cleon Skousen, B. McConkie, J.Fielding Smith–would themselves generate a rich source for such a database.) A wiki-style site might work. I wouldn’t restrict the range of permissible authors, beyond the requirement that they wrote for/in an LDS context.
I fully agree with Stapley in #11–cataloguing citation isn’t half as interesting as being able to track changes in usage over time.
Comment by Deep Sea — January 30, 2007 @ 10:58 am
“Scriptural Index to the Latter-day Prophets
The Kevin and Debra Rollins Center for eBusiness, Brigham Young University”
(see scripturesbeta.byu.edu)
The Commerce of Man, mingled with Scripture…
Comment by Deep Sea — January 30, 2007 @ 11:06 am
17, i saw that. what can you do?
I agree evolution over time is interesting, but I also think it would be useful to know what specific exegetes thought about specific scriptures. You can learn a lot about antebellum Christians from seeing how they read particular texts.
I’ll do some more thinking about this. I would look for a core set of documents and then (or simultaneously) expand, perhaps starting with -1844 inclusive then -1860 inclusive then -1877 or so.
I would think the first major sources would be
diaries:
JSJ Diary–Faulring
JSJ Papers–Jessee
McLellin diary–Shipps/welch
Zina DHJSY
George Laub
Joseph Fielding
Eliza RS
Words of JS
scripture:
D&C (cf Marquardt compilation)
BoM (perhaps skouzen’s critical edition)
JST?
Abraham
periodicals:
M&A
MS
Wasp
Neighbor
T&S
I would personally be interested in owning a paper copy of a JSJ inclusive volume and a pre-1860 general volume.
Comment by Sam MB — January 30, 2007 @ 5:04 pm
Sam,
A simple, unsophisticated way to start this would be to set up a wiki, invite participation, and see if enough contributors chime in with data that you actually have a living project going. If you do, you can put more energy into organizing, soliciting, etc. Costs would be $0 for the wiki software and MySQL database, plus probably $60 a year for hosting the web site, and the price of a good mole at The Red Iguana to pay KyleM for a little MediaWiki customization.
Comment by Stirling — January 30, 2007 @ 5:55 pm
Mmmm. Mole.
Too bad we don’t have the Red Iguana in Seattle.
Comment by KyleM — January 30, 2007 @ 6:02 pm
For your early range, I’d add perhaps:
H. C. Kimball Diary
Clayton Diaries.
WW Journals
Everything on Selected Collections
I would think the volumes might best be:
JS inclusive
Pre 1847
1848-1918
1919-2000
Comment by J. Stapley — January 30, 2007 @ 6:07 pm
21 — reasonable
20 — just melt a lot of licorice in butter and flour is my best guess
19–intriguing idea. will chew on it.
thanks,smb
Comment by Sam MB — January 30, 2007 @ 10:01 pm
I think this is a great idea, and I think it the Feast wiki could quite easily host the manuscripts. The harder part will be indexing the passages in a useful and user-friendly way. I think a skilled programmer might be able to automate this, in a database or through the wiki, but it’d be quite easy to index this by hand on the wiki.
If anyone’s interested in doing this or discussing this more, send me (us) email and we can discuss it more: fZeZaZsZtZbZlZoZg@gmail.com (without the Z’s). If we get sufficient interest, we’ll write up a blog with some preliminary ideas and plans at the Feast blog.
Comment by Robert C. — February 1, 2007 @ 5:15 pm
Robert C, that may be an excellent infrastructure given Kevin’s preexisting footnotes. Just in the last week while I’ve been re-reading Wasp and Times and Seasons I’ve bumped into several fascinating exegetical moves that would be nice to have recorded for additional reference.
Comment by Sam MB — February 7, 2007 @ 8:59 pm