Articles on Pre-earth life? Help?

Do you know of any good articles about Mormon thought about the pre-existence? I am looking for something academic, though it can be of an apologetic nature. I need sources for documenting my account of the role of the pre-existence in Mormon thinking. I would also be interested in anything dealing with the council in heaven.

This is part of my dissertation chapter that I started addressing in this post.

I realize that I have the research skills should allow me to this on my own. But I am tired and overwhelmed. I need help from my bloggernacle brothers and sisters. Thanks.

15 Replies to “Articles on Pre-earth life? Help?”

  1. If you click on the link to my paper from Justin above, I give the citations to both the Harrell and Ostler articles.

  2. Some of what Givens does in biblical interpretation might be useful for you. He mentions some of what have become standard LDS biblical references to preexistence, but as they were seen among non-LDS exegetes. “before I formed thee in the belly. . . ” etc.

  3. Section two of Daymon Mickel Smith’s dissertation, “The First Shall Be the Last and the Last Shall Be the First: Discourse and Mormon History” deals in part with BY and the Pratts’ concepts of Intelligence and Matter–I haven’t actually read it, so I can’t say whether it works or not or what it adds to the discussion, but I know it’s there.

  4. Truman Madsen, Eternal Man has a thoughtful discussion.

    John W. Welch has a FARMS Preliminary Report comparing Oh My Father to the Hymn of the Pearl. Nibley also discusses the Hymn of the Pearl in the Appendices to An Egyptian Endowment.

    Nibley discusses the early Christian Timothy’s Discourse on Abbaton in Enoch the Prophet, and Howard Hopkins has put the discourse online at his http://www.thinlyveiled.com

    Kevin Christensen
    Bethel Park, PA

  5. It’s available digitally via UMI. It is very interesting. The introduction is generally incomprehensible, but I have found his treatment of 20th century priesthood dynamics very useful. And his sources for the section on correlation are simply amazing.

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