Author: John Crawford

Today’s game features a battle of two LDS academics:

Lowell Bennion was the first director of the LDS Institute of Religion at the University of Utah and a professor of Sociology. His biography is reviewed here and here and who is quoted here. A brief biography is given here and here is a collection of works by him.

Truman Madsen is an emeritus professor of Philosophy at BYU and was the Richard L. Evans chair of Christian Understanding. He has written several books on LDS doctrine, including, most famously, a series of lectures on Joseph Smith.

Please vote to the left and comment below.

Hellmut Lotz always inspires thought in me. Usually, I try to find the quickest way to contradict him (as I don’t usually agree with his conclusions). He came to a conclusion today over here and I decided that to question him on it would constitute a threadjack. So, instead, I am poaching.

Hellmut said, “As for God, there is no reason to believe that he or she requires our devotion. We cannot hurt God. If our devotion were important then God would have an obligation to let us know. ”

My initial response is, if we cannot hurt God, why does he weep? In the LDS tradition, God does feel personal sorrow when confronted with his wayward children. Should Hellmut’s statement be construed as a denial of that belief?

I doubt it. I think what Hellmut meant was that God’s salvation isn’t ultimately dependent upon human activity, which appears to be standard Mormon doctrine. Nonetheless, the question intrigues me. So, I put it to you, in three parts.

1. Can we hurt God in any way, aside from the causation of sorrow due to our sins?
2. If our sin is the only manner in which we hurt God, does that alter our perception of our purpose in coming to earth?
3. If our sin is the only manner in which we hurt God, does that alter our image of God?

When last we checked, more people were disturbed by possible polyandry than polygyny on the part of the Prophet Joseph. This week, we continue my personal campaign to put things in perspective:

Who is more influential in the church today: Emma Hale Smith or Marjorie Pay Hinckley?

Emma Smith: wife of the Prophet Joseph Smith, recipient of D&C 25, subject of two books and several pieces of variable quality artwork at deseretbook.com.

Marjorie Hinckley: wife of the current prophet, recipient of degrees, subject of three books at deseretbook.com (but no variable quality artwork).

Take a side in this fight below and post your thoughts on the process.

This is the second part of the first post from Dan Belnap.

Clothing and Definitions
But the Garden story is not wholly concerned with nakedness, or rather remaining in a state of nakedness. There are also two scenes concerning the preparation and presentation of clothing. If nakedness represents the loss of one’s identity, which Adam and Eve have, then clothing represents one’s identity, and changes of clothing may represent new identities. It has long been recognized that clothing are powerful symbols as to the status and authority of an individual by defining the individual. The choice of clothing by the individual tells us both how he or she views him or herself, and how they wish to be defined by others. As others have noted, clothing acts as like a language, silently providing clues as to how this individual is to be perceived and therefore interacted with. As one scholar put it, “more than any other material product, clothing plays a symbolic role in mediating the relationship between nature, man, and his sociocultural environment.” Therefore, understanding the symbolic role that clothing plays in the definition of the individual is particularly important when clothing is presented in the text. This can done in two ways: 1) by reviewing the way in which the wearing of clothing represented the identity, including new identities with changes of clothing, and 2) and by studying the act of giving clothing to others thereby providing new identities and definitions.
Continue reading “Guest Post – Clothes Make the Man Part Two”