Scholars and General Authorities

On Saturday night, we went out with friends for dinner and to see the film Fighting with My Family, produced by (and including) Dwayne Johnson.  It’s not exactly the world that I live in, but I actually enjoyed the movie quite a bit.  We had dinner at Zao’s, in Orem — a place that I’ve grown to like very much.

Last night, Monday night, we met with a larger group of friends for dinner and then, afterwards, attended a performance of the play A Gentleman’s Guide to Love and Murder at the Hale Centre Theatre, which we also enjoyed.

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A few days ago, I posted a couple of quotations from Elder M. Russell Ballard, who is currently serving as acting president of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles.  (See “If any of you lack wisdom, let him Google!”)

Here’s another item, related to those quotations:  In November 2017, Elder Ballard told his audience that his calling and his life experiences enable him to answer certain types of questions, but that other questions may require answers from experts in the subject matter specific to them.  “It is important to remember, I am a General Authority,” he said. “But that doesn’t make me an authority in general.”  (See “BYU Devotional: Elder Ballard’s ‘questions and answers.'”)

My point in citing such statements is to preface a comment on the role of scholarship in the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.

To me, learning and scholarship are of extraordinary interest and great importance.  If I didn’t think so, I wouldn’t have chosen the career that I did.  (I certainly didn’t choose it for its upward financial mobility.)  But they are no more holy as a job choice than is any other legal and ethically acceptable vocation.

Academia is no better, essentially, than farming, accounting, housekeeping, medicine, retail merchandising, or working in a restaurant.  The souls of academics are no more valuable than those of shoemakers or miners or grocers.

Can scholars be of specific use to the Kingdom?  Yes, certainly.  But so can carpenters and pavers and graders.

Leaders of the Church hold special status because of the positions to which they’ve been called, and occasionally they will want to call upon people with particular academic qualifications for assistance.  But this is no different, in principle, from their calling upon architects, carpenters, artists, bricklayers, electricians, pavers, plumbers, and graders when they need help constructing a new chapel or stake center or temple.

What is unique to the General Authorities of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and puts them in a class apart is their calling as special witnesses of the Savior and their possession of the keys of priesthood authority.

Pretty obvious Latter-day Saint doctrine, one might think.  But I’m occasionally accused of seeking to challenge the authority of Church leaders, of feeling that academics are superior to mere apostles.  Nothing could possibly be further from the truth.  And, for those who’ve been speculating lately about a supposed rift between me and the Brethren:  My relationship with them has never, I think, been better than it is right now.  Which is about as specific as I intend to be about the matter.