Daniel C. Peterson's Blog, page 1031

“Insights into the Authenticity of the Book of Mormon”

    An interesting piece, kindly brought to my attention by Zander Sturgill, on the distinct authors of the Book of Mormon:   http://ldsmag.com/insights-into-the-a...   Several others have approached the topic of potentially multiple authorship from different perspectives.  Here are two relevant books:   Roger R. Keller, Book of Mormon Authors: Their Words and Messages   Grant [Read More...]

New Testament 279

    Matthew 22:1-14 Compare 8:12; Luke 14:15-24   Plainly, this famous parable points to the rejection of Jesus by his fellow Jews and to their eventual replacement by the Gentiles.   These things seem to provide types and archetypes, though, and history, as seen through a scriptural lens, tends to repeat itself (obviously with variations) [Read More...]

They come through, eventually and inevitably

    Our life always expresses the result of our dominant thoughts.  (Søren Kierkegaard)    

City Lights and Seafood

    Some people have quirky touristic interests.  I certainly do.   I love, for example, to visit college and university campuses.   And iconic, culturally significant bookstores.   Thus, for example, I’ve made my pilgrimages — multiple times in each case — to Blackwell’s in Oxford, to Powell’s in Portland, to Schoenhof’s near Harvard, to New [Read More...]

New Testament 278

    Matthew 21:33-46 Mark 12:1-12 Luke 20:9-19   Cornerstones serve no vital structural function in modern building.  Indeed, they’re often added very late in the construction process, during purely ceremonial events.  In premodern times, though, the cornerstone was used to align the other foundations and walls, etc., of a new structure.  It was placed [Read More...]

“Women’s priesthood advocate [Kate Kelly] calls new LDS Church essays ‘lies’”

    There are many points in this 9:30-minute video interview where I would want to comment — e.g., I think it very debatable that gender-related wage gaps in Utah or elsewhere in the United States have much directly to do with “patriarchy,” let alone with Mormonism — but I do think that Ms. Kelly’s remarks [Read More...]

On science and Christian belief

    The eminent American astronomer Allan Sandage (1926–2010) worked for many years at the Carnegie Observatories in Pasadena, California, and lived in the nearby town of San Gabriel, only a few blocks from the house in which I grew up.  One of my great disappointments is that I learned this only very shortly before he [Read More...]

Divine grace in Islam

    A hadith qudsi attributed to the Prophet Muhammad on the authority of Anas b. Malik (and collected in the Sahih of al-Bukhari) represents God as saying the following:   When a servant of mine advances a foot toward me, I advance a yard toward him.  And when he advances a yard toward me, [Read More...]

On trying to pass responsibility off to others

    “It often happens that I wake up at night and begin to think about a serious problem and decide I must tell the Pope about it.  Then I wake up completely and remember that I am the Pope.” Pope Saint John XXIII   Posted from San Francisco, California  

New Testament 277

    Matthew 21:28-32 Compare Luke 7:29-30 A simple observation:  Someone setting out to demonstrate the Protestant teaching of salvation by grace alone, without works — sola fide, sola gratia – would, I think, have a very difficult time doing so solely from the teachings of Jesus Christ as recorded in the four New Testament gospels. [Read More...]