https://thirdhour.org/blog/faith/big-list-anti-mormon-literature A sample of LDS sources on anti-Mormonism follows: Allen, James B., and Leonard J. Arrington. 1 year ago. This volume includes classics of anti-Mormon literature: - Mormonism Unvailed, by E. D. Howe - The Book of Mormon Contradictory to Common Sense, Reason, and Revelation, by J. M. Burgess - Mormonism Exposed, by G. B. Hancock It includes illustrations, photographs, and a comprehensive interactive table of contents. Most “anti-Mormon literature” as we like to call it, is in my opinion ridiculous and pulled from obscure quotes by various prophets and not at all what we teach today. We are doing all of this because Boadicea, though wildly inaccurate, was extremely influential. At the Capitol, we saw the best and the worst of US Mormonism, ‘Lo, a virgin shall conceive’ … or not, depending on the translation, © Copyright 2020, Religion News Service. Treats the film The Godmakers. Use of and/or registration on any portion of this site constitutes acceptance of our, a book coming out in January from Prometheus, a memoir coming in November from HarperCollins, Cult Shock: The Book Jehovah’s Witnesses and Mormons Don’t Want You to Read, Mormonism was adding to its membership at rates between three and nearly nine (!) Bunker, Gary L., and Davis Bitton. Salt Lake City, 1963. Excommunicated members tried to capitalize on their former membership in the Church to sell their stories. It seems reasonable to me to encourage people -- as you did -- to focus on modern, 20th-century Mormon doctrines, definitions, and emphases, and to disregard the abandoned, troubling doctrines of the past. All rights reserved. Oh, the sensationalist tales of those books! Independence, Mo., 1942, and Salt Lake City, 1952. Posted on November 16, 2018 December 6, 2018. Anti-Mormon writers were most prolific during the post-Brodie era. But what you have to realize is that no anti-Mormon literature is unbiased. Whew! Another common tactic is to attempt to show how statements by past Church leaders contradict those by current leaders on such points as Adam as God, blood Atonement, and plural marriage. In 1841, it was revealed that an Anti-Mormon Almanac would be published. History. “Joseph Smith’s New York Reputation Reappraised.” BYU Studies 10 (1970):283-314. The term, "anti-Mormon" first appears in the historical record in 1833 by the Louisville (Kentucky) Daily Herald in an article, "The Mormons and the Anti-Mormons" (the article was also the first known to label believers in the Book of Mormon as "Mormons"). Fanny Stenhouse’s Tell It All (1874) and Ann Eliza Young’s Wife No. A Full Exposure of its Secret Practices and Hidden Crimes, by Alfred Trumble It includes illustrations, photographs, and a comprehensive interactive table of contents. (churchofjesuschrist.org) Brodie’s interpretations have been followed by several other writers. Underwood, Grant. (1964, revised 1972, 1987), contains the essence of their claims against the Church. This volume includes classics of anti-Mormon literature: - Boadicea, The Mormon Wife, by Alfreda Eva Bell - Mormonism Exposed and Refused, or True and False Religion, by William Kirby - The Mysteries of Mormonism. As I once read from an anti-Mormon book there was one who counseled his followers to seek out new members who have not yet studied the gospel for themselves. I’ve even become friends with the people that bring it up for discussion. Alas, it’s time to do a postmortem on the genre of anti-Mormon books, because the genre is just a pale shadow of its former self. Anti-Mormon authors use the term "anti-Mormon" themselves Jerald and Sandra Tanner, some of the most well known anti-Mormon writers, use the term "anti-Mormon" to refer to others who oppose the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Mormonism slows to its lowest growth levels since 2016. Jeremy Runnells spread his aggregation of criticisms in his “CES Letter”. Kirkham, Francis W. A New Witness for Christ in America, 2 vols. History. Traces the history of anti-Mormon caricature. He “collected” affidavits from seventy-two contemporaries who professed to know Joseph Smith and were willing to speak against him. There is no reason we can’t respect people’s opinions and still be friends. He would use church books, not anti-Mormon literature, to show me there conflicts with church doctrine. All too often religious literature and political positions are labeled anti-Mormon prematurely. Oh, the lurid accounts of hearts corrupted, families wrecked, and brains washed by the false religion of the Latter-day Saints! Despite a generally favorable press toward the Church during many of these years, of all anti-Mormon books, novels, pamphlets, tracts, and flyers published in English before 1990, more than half were published between 1960 and 1990 and a third of them between 1970 and 1990. Nibley, Hugh W. “Censoring the Joseph Smith Story,” IE 64 (July, Aug., Oct., Nov. 1961). A relief: here’s an evangelical book that fits the older mold. Anti-Mormon literature will be filled with scriptures or quotes that are taken out of context and twisted to serve the author’s purpose of filling people’s minds with doubt about the Church. The book influenced future anti-Mormon literature. Second, her sources were mainly biased anti-Mormon documents collected primarily in the New York Public Library, Yale Library, and Chicago Historical Library. 1946]:154). We’d be hard pressed to find that now, with Christian Science struggling and its membership in decline. The critics in the last 20 years have gotten their notoriety not through new material or scholarship, but through online podcasts or PDF sharing of all material they inherited from the past. From the Tanners. Foster, Craig L. “Henry Caswall: Anti-Mormon Extraordinaire.” BYU Studies 35:4 (1995-96):144-159. For me, much of the anti-Mormon literature that comes up is in fact more evidence of the Church being true. The book repudiated the Rigdon-Spaulding theory, revived the Alexander Campbell thesis that Joseph Smith alone was the author of the book, and postulated that View of the Hebrews (following Riley, 1903) provided the basic source material for the Book of Mormon. The main basis for this judgment is that the Mormon belief in the Christian Godhead is different from the traditional Christian doctrine of the Trinity. What the heck is going on with the disappearance of anti-Mormon literature? The most notable anti-Mormon work of this period, Mormonism Unvailed (sic), was published by Eber D. Howe in 1834. This statement I found highly offensive, as it assumed that because I disagreed with the… : From the Encyclopedia of Mormonism’s section on “Anti-Mormon Publications:”. Maria Ward (a pseudonym) depicted Mormon torture of women in Female Life Among the Mormons (1855). Historian Gerrit J. Dirkmaat explains the origin of one of Joseph Smith’s most prominent early antagonists, Doctor Philastus Hurlbut. These networks distribute anti-Mormon literature, provide lectures that attack the Church publicly, and proselytize Mormons. Third, she began with a predetermined conclusion that shaped her work: “I was convinced,” she wrote, “before I ever began writing that Joseph Smith was not a true prophet,” and felt compelled to supply an alternative explanation for his works (quoted in Newell G. Bringhurst, “Applause, Attack, and Ambivalence-Varied Responses to Fawn M. Brodie’s No Man Knows My History,” Utah Historical Quarterly 57 [Winter 1989]:47-48). It’s the equivalent of taking some quote from one of the Christian crusaders and using it against all Christians. Walter F. Prince and Theodore Schroeder offered explanations for Book of Mormon names by way of imaginative but remote psychological associations. Kimball, Edward L. Review of Victims: The LDS Church and the Mark Hofmann Case, by Richard E. Turley, Jr. Larson, Jennifer. March 1, 2015. Mormon505. The 1987 Directory of Cult Research Organizations contains more than a hundred anti-Mormon listings. . "The anti-Mormon document we are discussing lists 36 parallels between Ethan Smith’s book and the Book of Mormon. Salt Lake City, 1961. What Difference does it make? The result of this was that I was told to 'stop reading anti-mormon literature.' Almost all of them are silly or completely disingenuous. Bushman, Richard L. Joseph Smith and the Beginnings of Mormonism. Its the same process with anti mormon literature. Nibley, Hugh W. The Prophetic Book of Mormon, CWHN 8 chaps. Jim is an incredibly witty, entertaining, and talented writer. Serialized articles examining how fifty anti-Mormon works treat the Joseph Smith story. (by La Roy Sunderland, John Bennett, and John A. Clark). This and the upcoming volumes are not meant to criticize the LDS … Close • Posted by 4 minutes ago. I have been grateful for much of it because it has caused me to reflect on issues that I did not previously consider. These documents allege that the Smiths were money diggers and irresponsible people. Baker has a 2015 title, Mormonism 101, but it’s only an expanded version of an older backlist book, not a new work. Hurlbut was hired by an anti-Mormon committee to find those who would attest to Smith’s dishonesty. Download it once and read it on your Kindle device, PC, phones or tablets. Allen, Julie K. and David L. Paulsen. From Decker. John Dehlin runs a podcast in Cache Valley. Quite interesting. Introvigne, Massimo. Even Vardis Fisher criticized her book, writing that it was “almost more a novel than a biography because she rarely hesitates to give the content of a mind or to explain motives which at best can only be surmised” (p. 57). Use features like bookmarks, note taking and highlighting while reading An American Fraud. Fourth, by using a psychobiographical approach, she imputed thoughts and motives to Joseph Smith. My husband’s friend asked him if he ever said anything negative about his greek orthodox beliefs. Apart from collecting them for historical purposes and in response to divine direction, the Church has largely ignored these materials, for they strike most members as irresponsible misrepresentations.”. 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