My wife and I had the opportunity, tonight, to tour the new Provo City Center Temple prior its fully-public pre-dedication open house.  The building is magnificently well done.  A beautiful homage to the people who built the original tabernacle in the nineteenth century.   By all means, if you’re in the area, go.   (For free tickets, go to this site.)   And you might enjoy looking at this item on “Mormon Newsroom,” which includes both the Church’s seven-minute video about the new... Read more

    A couple of quick comments, today, on 1 Nephi 18:   1.   If one grants Hugh Nibley’s view that Lehi had a background in caravan trade, the names of his children may almost mark out his life’s story.   Laman and Lemuel, his two eldest sons, bear names that seem to come from the northwestern part of the Arabian Peninsula.  Laman, for example, is Semitic, but not Hebrew.  Lihyanite was a language that was spoken in that area around... Read more

    “Always be a little kinder than necessary.”  (James M. Barrie)     Read more

    I like this short piece by the historian, blogger, and Salt Lake Tribune columnist Ardis Parshall very much, and I commend it to you:   http://www.keepapitchinin.org/2016/01/11/outside-the-house-of-god/     Read more

    These folks aren’t exactly overly saturated with the milk of human kindness:   http://www.foxnews.com/world/2016/01/11/isis-burns-fighters-alive-for-letting-ramadi-fall.html?intcmp=hpbt2   And reports that I heard this morning indicate (a) that the number of foreign fighters who’ve joined ISIS has soared from approximately 20,000, last year, to roughly 36,000 this year, and (b) that ISIS may now be experimenting with battlefield use of chemical weapons such as mustard gas (well known from the trenches of World War One and prohibited by all international law),... Read more

      In 1 Nephi 17, the self-exiled party of travelers from Jerusalem reaches what, in order to distinguish it from the New World land and city of the same name, is often called Lehi’s Old World Bountiful.  (For some further information, see here and here and here.)   A number of scholars, including myself, are strongly inclined to think that the site has been located, at the place where the Wadi Sayq opens onto the Arabian Sea at Khor Kharfot.         Read more

    For those of you who might still be unaware of the research and writing of Ugo Perego, or who might have let it somehow slip their minds, here are two worthwhile links:   http://www.josephsmithdna.com   https://www.gofundme.com/JosephSmithDNA?utm_source=internal&utm_medium=email&utm_content=body_photo&utm_campaign=upd_n     Read more

    It’s common, in some anti-Mormon circles, to snicker at the name of Brian Hales and to deride him as an amateur (he’s an M.D.) whom real scholars ignore.  Is such dismissal justified?   http://www.plonialmonimormon.com/2016/01/is-work-of-brian-hales-taken-seriously.html           Read more

    If he becomes the Republican nominee, I’ll support Ted Cruz.   And not just while holding my nose.  There’s much to like about him.   But I do worry about his views on national security, for reasons partially set forth here.   I always describe myself as having libertarian tendencies, especially in economics, but I never call myself a libertarian simpliciter.  And the principal reason for that is my inability to accept the hardcore Libertarian (with a capital... Read more

    If you want others to be happy, practice compassion. If you want to be happy, practice compassion. The Dalai Lama       Read more