Continuing the excerpts from my files and notes:   “Having been a boarder in General Smith’s family for more than nine months,” wrote John M. Bernhisel, a physician who later served as Utah’s delegate to the United States Congress, with abundant opportunities to contemplate his character and observe his conduct, I have concluded to give you a few of my “impressions” of him. General Joseph Smith is naturally a man of strong mental powers, and is possessed of... Read more

    One of the proposed explanations for Joseph Smith is that he was, simply, a conscious (and conscienceless) liar.  This wouldn’t, in my view, even begin to account for the facts of the early Restoration.  Beyond that, though, it seems to me unsustainable in and of itself.  Here’s a brief (and only partial) passage on the topic from one of my note files:   Joseph Smith’s honesty and sincerity shines in his personal writings.  (We’ll talk about his associates... Read more

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      From one of The Manuscripts:   Poetry and Poets Poetry was the sole medium of literary expression in pre-Islamic Arabia. In a real sense, it was the only form of art. This is related at least partially to the high Semitic reverence for the word that we’ve already mentioned. It’s also undoubtedly related to the fact that nomads, constantly on the brink of starvation and always on the move, are hardly likely to produce great architecture or... Read more

    A temple, good or bad, is a scale-model of the universe. [I believe] the first mention of the word templum is by Varro, for whom it designates a building specially designed for interpreting signs in the heavens—a sort of observatory where one gets one’s bearings on the universe. “What Is a Temple?” Collected Works of Hugh Nibley 4:357-58   ***   We had dinner, this evening, over at the home of the president and matron of the Indiana Indianapolis Temple, with all... Read more

      Some quotations from one of the greatest economists — and, certainly, one of the greatest economists of the free market — of the twentieth century, Ludwig von Mises (whom, alas, I never met):   “The worst evils which mankind has ever had to endure were inflicted by bad governments.”   “Whoever wants peace among nations must seek to limit the state and its influence most strictly.”   “The champions of socialism call themselves progressives, but they recommend... Read more

    They were certainly thought to be literal and physical:   Both Lucy Mack Smith and Joseph Knight, Sr., personally remember the time, very late in the night of 21 September and into the morning of the following day, when Joseph and Emma Smith went to retrieve the plates from the Hill Cumorah, and each supplies independent details concerning the events involved.[1] Joseph Knight, Jr. — “In 1827 [the winter of 1826-1827] he [my father] hired Joseph Smith. Joseph... Read more

    The British medievalist C. S. Lewis, writing in 1947:  “The immensity of the universe is not a recent discovery.  More than seventeen hundred years ago Ptolemy taught that in relation to the distance of the fixed stars the whole Earth must be regarded as a point with no magnitude.  His astronomical system was universally accepted in the Dark and Middle Ages.  The insignificance of Earth was as much a commonplace to Boethius, King Alfred, Dante, and Chaucer as... Read more

    Carrying on with a brief passage from the book that I’ll eventually issue:   But it was not only the Jews who rejected the claims of the new prophet. The Qur’an describes both Jews and Christians as claim­ing that they are the only ones who will enter paradise. To this, the Qur’an responds that whoever “surrenders” (aslama) to God and does works of righteousness will be rewarded and need not fear.[1] Indeed, the Qur’an claims to go back... Read more