I saw this painting online today, and thought it was a striking representation of the dedication of Solomon’s Temple. It is by French painter James Jacques Joseph Tissot, c. 1896-1902, gouache on board, stored at the Jewish Museum, New York.
Solomon Dedicates the Temple at Jerusalem, by James Jacques Joseph Tissot (c. 1896-1902)
Dr. Peterson gives his address at 2010 FAIR Conference (Photo by R. Scott Lloyd)
I thought I’d take a moment and give a shout out for The Foundation for Apologetic Information and Research (FAIR) and their 14th annual conference coming up in less than a month, on August 2-3, 2012, in Sandy, Utah. I have attended this conference in years past (which I liveblogged in 2008), and I will be attending again this year.
For those interested in the temple, topics will include “Book of Abraham, I Presume” by John Gee, and “Piercing the Veil: Temple Worship in the Lost 116 Pages” by Don Bradley, as well as many other very interesting subjects. Those that are interested in the ongoing FARMS/Maxwell Institute situation, the original founder of FARMS, John W. Welch, will be speaking about his further research on chiasmus, as will former Mormon Studies Review/FARMS Review editor Daniel C. Peterson, on the topic “Of ‘Mormon Studies’ and Apologetics,” which should be interesting given recent events.
It is significant to note that this year that you don’t have to travel to Sandy, Utah, to take part. The conference will also be available online via live video/audio streaming! You can sit in the comfort of your living room, or even on-the-go via your mobile smartphone or tablet, from anywhere in the world, and take part in this excellent conference. This news comes direct from FAIR:
This year we are providing Conference streaming for your Windows, Android, Apple, and even Roku devices. Here is a way for you to have your own FAIR Conference in your home. Hook it up to your big-screen TV and invite over your friends for a FAIR Conference event. We have updated our technology on this, so the price for streaming the conference into your home, or two your phones, computers or tablets is $15 for each day or $25 for both days. When you sign up, in the comments section please mention which device or devices you are planning on using (Roku, iphone, ipad, Android tablet, etc.)
Sign up for the two days of streaming here: http://bookstore.fairlds.org/product.php?id_product=1314
Thursday-only streaming here: http://bookstore.fairlds.org/product.php?id_product=1085
Friday-only streaming here: http://bookstore.fairlds.org/product.php?id_product=1313
Read more about the upcoming FAIR Conference here.
Update: I’ve changed some information here, as Trevor has given more details.
Lapis specularis, or specularibus lapidibus, is a variety of gypsum (selenite) that forms crystal sheets and they were used as window panes in the first and second centuries AD.
“For now we see through a glass, darkly; but then face to face: now I know in part; but then shall I know even as also I am known” (1 Corinthians 13:12).
This scripture from the New Testament has often been used to describe our current estate in life, our vision and perception being a bit muddled as we go about our daily lives. We don’t understand everything, we can’t see everything, we don’t know why some things are the way they are. We don’t live by perfect light and knowledge. Indeed, it is a good scripture on the topic of faith, and how we must live by imperfect understanding, having a feeling for things but unable to grasp them fully. It also well describes what our LDS doctrine calls the veil (also spelled vail), this semi-impervious cloak and covering over God and his dominion. In a future day, the curtain will be drawn, and we will see with perfect clarity, and our understanding will become as clear as day.
Why must we live by this faith, why the separation from God by the veil? Why doesn’t God reveal himself? This is often the cry of the atheists, who seek evidence of God’s existence. I appreciated Dan Peterson’s explanation of this in his talk on “Humble Apologetics.” He said: [Read more…]
King Benjamin's Farewell Address - Minerva Teichert, 1935
Robert F. Smith has posted a good bibliography of studies on the temple in the Book of Mormon, which William Hamblin also posted. I thought I’d do the same, with direct links to the works (some even available for reading online). Many still believe that the Book of Mormon does not contain much of the temple in it, so this a good summary of some of the best reading on the subject:
Baker, LeGrand L.,, and Stephen D. Ricks, Who Shall Ascend Into the Hill of the Lord? The Psalms in Israel’s Temple Worship In the Old Testament and in the Book of Mormon (SLC: Eborn Books, 2010).
Bokovoy, David, “Temple Imagery in the Book of Mormon,” 4-part BYU Education Week lectures for 2011, summarized on MDDB.
Butler, D. John, Plain and Precious Things: The Temple Religion of the Book of Mormon’s Visionary Men (Amazon/Kindle eBook, 2012).
Christensen, Kevin, “The Temple, the Monarchy, and Wisdom: Lehi’s World and the Scholarship of Margaret Barker,” in Seely, Seely, and Welch, eds., Glimpses of Lehi’s Jerusalem (Covenant Communications, 2004), 449-522.
Parry, Donald W., “Service and Temple in King Benjamin’s Speech,” JBMS, 16/2 (2007), 42-47.
Ricks, Stephen D., “The Treaty/Covenant Pattern in King Benjamin’s Address (Mosiah 1- 6).” BYU Studies, 24/2 (Spring 1984), 151-162
Spencer, Joseph M., An Other Testament: On Typology (Salem: Salt Press, 2012).
Valletta, Thomas R., “Conflicting Orders: Alma and Amulek in Ammonihah,” in D. Parry and S. Ricks, eds., The Temple in Time and Eternity (Provo: FARMS, 1999), 183-231.
Welch, John W., The Sermon at the Temple and the Sermon on the Mount (SLC: Deseret, 1990). FARMS put out an expanded ed.
Welch, John W., Illuminating the Sermon at the Temple and Sermon on the Mount (Provo: FARMS, 1999).
Welch, John W., The Sermon on the Mount in Light of the Temple, SOTS (Ashgate, 2009). By implication.
Francis Scott Key's original manuscript copy of his "Star-Spangled Banner" poem. It is now on display at the Maryland Historical Society. (Click for larger view)
It was exactly 197 years, 9 months, and 20 days ago that one of the most revered poems in American history was written. On the morning of September 14, 1814, a young 35-year-old lawyer and amateur poet by the name of Francis Scott Key stood on the deck of a ship at dawn and looked out over the water of Chesapeake Bay, Maryland. There he saw in the sky, waving proudly in the morning light, a large American flag flying triumphantly over Fort McHenry. At that moment he knew that our country, the young United States of America, had been victorious in the intense and passionate battle with the British the night before.
Francis reached into his pocket, and pulled out a letter he had, and on the back hand side began to pen these inspired words:
O say can you see by the dawn’s early light,
What so proudly we hailed at the twilight’s last gleaming,
Whose broad stripes and bright stars through the perilous fight,
O’er the ramparts we watched, were so gallantly streaming?
And the rockets’ red glare, the bombs bursting in air,
Gave proof through the night that our flag was still there;
O say does that star-spangled banner yet wave,
O’er the land of the free and the home of the brave?
The 15-star, 15-stripe "Star Spangled Banner Flag" which inspired the poem, now on display at the Smithsonian's National Museum of History and Technology. (Click for larger view)
On the shore dimly seen through the mists of the deep,
Where the foe’s haughty host in dread silence reposes,
What is that which the breeze, o’er the towering steep,
As it fitfully blows, half conceals, half discloses?
Now it catches the gleam of the morning’s first beam,
In full glory reflected now shines in the stream:
‘Tis the star-spangled banner, O! long may it wave
O’er the land of the free and the home of the brave.
And where is that band who so vauntingly swore
That the havoc of war and the battle’s confusion,
A home and a country, should leave us no more?
Their blood has washed out their foul footsteps’ pollution.
No refuge could save the hireling and slave
From the terror of flight, or the gloom of the grave:
And the star-spangled banner in triumph doth wave,
O’er the land of the free and the home of the brave.
O thus be it ever, when freemen shall stand
Between their loved home and the war’s desolation.
Blest with vict’ry and peace, may the Heav’n rescued land
Praise the Power that hath made and preserved us a nation!
Then conquer we must, when our cause it is just,
And this be our motto: “In God is our trust.”
And the star-spangled banner in triumph shall wave
O’er the land of the free and the home of the brave!
