Sunday, November 30, 2014

A Quote from Elder Oaks

This quotation from Elder Dallin H. Oaks is worth pondering:
Sadly, some Latter-day Saints ridicule others for their reliance on revelation. Such ridicule tends to come from those whose scholarly credentials are high and whose spiritual credentials are low.

The Book of Mormon's major significance is its witness of Jesus Christ as the only begotten Son of God the Eternal Father who redeems and saves us from death and sin. If an account stands as a preeminent witness of Jesus Christ, how can it possibly make no difference whether the account is fact or fable—whether the persons really lived who prophesied of Christ and gave eye witnesses of his appearances to them?
This is part of a response to the following position:
Some who term themselves believing Latter-day Saints are advocating that Latter-day Saints should "abandon claims that [the Book of Mormon] is a historical record of the ancient peoples of the Americas." They are promoting the feasibility of reading and using the Book of Mormon as nothing more than a pious fiction with some valuable contents. These practitioners of so-called higher criticism raise the question of whether the Book of Mormon, which our prophets have put forward as the preeminent scripture of this dispensation, is fact or fable—history or just a story.
Among his conclusions, Elder Oaks lists the following:
5.  Those scholars who rely on faith and revelation as well as scholarship, and who assume the authenticity of the Book of Mormon, must endure ridicule from those who disdain these things of God.