December 5, 2023 • 51 mins
A fundamental moment in all good learning is that moment where we modify our assumptions about the world as a result of acquiring new and more accurate knowledge. This in turn hopefully primes us to make better decisions. On one level, it’s what learning is all about. Sounds pretty basic right? Well, it is. But it isn’t always easy. Church History can teach us that modifying one’s assumptions can be a challenge for some when it requires them to rethink their ideas about God, prophets, and the Church.
In this episode of Church History Matters we’re going to carefully look at this skill of humbly revising our assumptions in light of better or more accurate information—a skill we’re calling “mental flexibility”—and then take a look at key moments in the lives of a few people in our Church’s history that show us why this skill is so crucial for durable discipleship.
For show notes and transcript for this and other episodes go to https://doctrineandcovenantscentral.org/church-history-matters-podcast/
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Scott Woodward (00:05):
A fundamental moment in all good learning is that moment
where we modify our assumptions aboutthe world as a result of acquiring
new and more accurate knowledge.
This, in turn, primes usto make better decisions.
On one level, it's whatlearning is all about.
Sounds pretty basic, right?
Well, it is.
(00:26):
But it isn't always easy.
Church history can teach us thatmodifying one's assumptions can be a
challenge for some when it requiresthem to rethink their ideas about
God, prophets, and the church.
In today's episode of Church HistoryMatters, we're going to carefully look
at this skill of humbly revising ourassumptions in light of better or more
(00:46):
accurate information, a skill we'recalling mental flexibility, and then
take a look at key moments in thelives of a few people in our church's
history that show us why this skill isso crucial for durable discipleship.
I'm Scott Woodward, and my co-host isCasey Griffiths, and today we dive into
our sixth episode of this series dealingwith truth seeking and good thinking.
(01:10):
Now, let's get into it.
Casey Paul Griffiths (01:22):
Hi, Scott.
How you doing?
Scott Woodward (01:24):
Good.
How you doing, Casey?
Casey Paul Griffiths (01:25):
Good.
I'm excited to get to our topic today.
We're continuing—what didwe decide to call this?
We haven't settled on a name yet, have we?
Scott Woodward (01:34):
Listen, yeah, our listeners will just laugh at us because
this is episode six in this series.
So it has already gone out there.
It's been named, but please know,everybody, that at this point we
still don't know what to call it.
Casey Paul Griffiths (01:46):
I've been consistent in my advocacy for Toolbox of Truth.
Scott Woodward (01:51):
Epistemological tool belt.
I don't know.
Casey Paul Griffiths (01:56):
It's been really enjoyable so far to get
a chance to talk about this.
Scott Woodward (02:00):
Yeah.
Casey Paul Griffiths (02:00):
This is usually what we do kind of near the beginning
of our church history coursesbefore we dive into the history.
Scott Woodward (02:07):
Yeah.
Casey Paul Griffiths (02:07):
This is sort of setting the table, basically, to
understand how we talk about history,how we know if it's good history
or bad history, and how you canuse history as a tool to strengthen
your testimony if you have the rightkind of mindset as you approach it.
Scott Woodward (02:23):
Our burning question of the series has been, what mental
moves are made by intelligent,critically thinking Latter-day Saints
whose faith is strengthened ratherthan damaged by diving deeply into our
church's history and doctrine, right?
Or, in other words, what frameworksof thinking do they use when
approaching scripture and history?
Some people seem to have their faithrocked, and other people, their
(02:46):
faith is affirmed and strengthened.
What's the difference?
What's going on inside, mentally?
And so that's whatwe've been trying to do.
And so far, I think it's beenfun, hopefully productive,
and helpful for our listeners.
Casey Paul Griffiths (02:59):
And I think if we have a theme scripture that we base
this around, Doctrine and Covenants88 verses 118, which we've read
before—I'll read again (03:07):
“And as all have not faith, seek ye diligently.
Teach one another words of wisdom.
Seek ye out of the bestbooks words of wisdom.
Seek learning, even by study andalso by faith.” Seek learning.
The Lord wants us to be inquisitive andcurious and search out the truth and
do a deep dive into things like churchhistory, but also do so in a wise way.
Scott Woodward (03:31):
And it's awesome that that verse highlights that the Lord's solution
to not having faith is to seek learning.
Like, dig deeper with other seekers, outof the best books, by study and faith.
Like, what an awesome solution, right?
We don't need to be afraid of knowledge.
We need to go deeper into itas part of the Lord's remedy
for those who have not faith.
Casey Paul Griffiths (03:52):
Absolutely.
And just to use modern prophetsto affirm what the scriptures
have already taught, we've alsomentioned this quote from Dieter F.
Uchtdorf.
He said, “Latter-day Saints are not askedto blindly accept everything they hear.
We are encouraged to think anddiscover truth for ourselves.
We're expected to ponder, to search,to evaluate, and thereby to come to
a personal knowledge of the truth.
(04:14):
I went to the Education Weekdevotional this year where Elder
Renlund said we learn throughreason, observation, and faith,
that all these skills come together.
Scott Woodward (04:23):
Such a good talk.
We should put that in the show notes.
That talk was amazing.
Casey Paul Griffiths (04:27):
That was a great talk and highlights what
is great about Latter-day Saintepistemology, which is this idea that
truth is truth where'er 'tis found,on heathen or on Christian ground.
Scott Woodward (04:38):
Did you just write that?
Casey Paul Griffiths (04:40):
No!
That was—I wrote a book about a guy namedJoseph Merrill, and that was his theme.
He would quote that all the time.
He was a physicist and an apostle.
Scott Woodward (04:48):
I thought you were just busting into, like,
limerick or something there.
That was—
Casey Paul Griffiths (04:52):
Oh, yeah.
Yeah.
I've got all this—I'm a regular Thomas S.
Monson.
I've got all these poems memorized thatI can just break out whenever I need to.
Let's review really quickwhat we've already done—
Scott Woodward (05:03):
Okay.
Casey Paul Griffiths (05:03):
—so that we can get to what we're doing today.
So first we just introduced thisidea of, hey, it's good to be a
seeker, good to find these things.
Our second episode, I thinkwe talked a little bit about
evaluating what is church teaching.
We used three lenses.
The lenses are scripture and prophetsand the guidance of the Holy Spirit used
(05:25):
together as checks and balances on eachother to find out what the truth is and
how reliable a source is in saying, hey,this is actually what the church teaches.
This is church doctrine.
Scott Woodward (05:36):
Yeah.
Casey Paul Griffiths (05:37):
And then we did a practice.
Scott Woodward (05:39):
We played a little doctrinal pickleball in episode three.
Casey Paul Griffiths (05:41):
Yeah.
And I don't know who won,but we got a good workout,
and that was the whole point.
Scott Woodward (05:45):
That was fun.
Yeah.
That was the point.
It was all about the exercise.
Casey Paul Griffiths (05:48):
Absolutely.
And then in our fourth episode, wetalked about history, historicity,
how do you tell good history frombad history, and ran through a couple
examples of that using five questionshistorians use to discern reliable
historical claims from less reliable.
And then we practiced a couple of claimslinked to Book of Mormon witnesses.
Scott Woodward (06:09):
Yeah.
That was our last episode.
That was fun.
Good time.
Casey Paul Griffiths (06:11):
That was fun.
So, tell us what we're doing today, Scott.
What's the plan?
Scott Woodward (06:15):
Okay.
So today we're introducing a newskill or mindset that we're calling
mental flexibility, all right?
So mental flexibility, I believe,is crucial to maintaining and
building true faith, like rock-ribbedfaith, the kind that endures.
Durable discipleship must have inthe tool kit mental flexibility.
(06:39):
It pushes against fixed thinking, whichcan be quite detrimental in many areas of
life, but particularly to a life of faith.
So let me define the term here.
So mental flexibility is the ability toidentify, challenge, and modify one's own
assumptions in light of new informationafter humble and honest analysis.
(07:01):
Do we have the ability to identifyour assumptions, challenge those
assumptions, and modify thoseassumptions in light of new information?
And if we can do that, we are well on ourway to the path of durable discipleship.
If we cannot do that, then ourbeliefs become brittle, and they
can break under pressure, is howI would summarize it briefly.
Casey Paul Griffiths (07:21):
A book that you and I both read in the last couple weeks, and
I don't think we planned this, did we?
We just—
Scott Woodward (07:26):
No, we didn't talk about it.
Casey Paul Griffiths (07:28):
It's not a book by an apostle.
Scott Woodward (07:30):
No.
Casey Paul Griffiths (07:30):
But it's a great book that we're going
to give a little shout out to.
It's by a guy named Adam Grant.
Scott Woodward (07:34):
Yes.
Casey Paul Griffiths (07:35):
The name of the book is Think Again, where it's
basically about being mentally flexible.
Scott Woodward (07:40):
Yeah.
I'd call it one of the best books.
You know, when you drill down toa particular topic, the best book
on that topic may not be by aLatter-day Saint, and that's okay.
As Joseph Smith says, we'll taketruth from wherever it comes, right?
Truth is truth, where'er 'tis found.
Go ahead, Casey.
What's the
. . .? Casey Paul Griffiths: “On heathen or on Christian ground.” And we're
not saying Adam Grant is a heathen.
(08:01):
No, he's awesome.
Casey Paul Griffiths (08:02):
But—
Scott Woodward (08:03):
I love Adam Grant.
Casey Paul Griffiths (08:04):
We admire the flexibility that he's shown.
Scott Woodward (08:06):
Yeah, when it comes to the topic of rethinking your
assumptions or to dig into thisskill set of mental flexibility.
I can't think of a better bookthan Think Again by Adam Grant.
So there you go.
Casey Paul Griffiths (08:18):
Amen.
And so a couple quotes from the book.
He says, “Intelligence is traditionallyviewed as the ability to think and learn.
Yet in a turbulent world, there's anotherset of cognitive skills that might matter
more (08:30):
the ability to rethink and unlearn.”
Scott Woodward (08:35):
Ah, shoot.
Now that's a great quotespiritually as well.
Like, if you want to maintain yourtestimony in a turbulent world, it
is crucial to have this skill set.
Can you rethink, and can you unlearn?
What else?
Any other good quotes?
Casey Paul Griffiths (08:48):
Ah, I like this one.
He says, “When it comes toour knowledge and opinions,
we tend to stick to our guns.
Psychologists call thisseizing and freezing.
We favor the comfort of conviction overthe discomfort of doubt, and we let our
beliefs get brittle long before our bones.
We listen to views that make us feelgood instead of ideas that make us
(09:10):
think hard.” I'm guessing, you know,sometimes a person that wants to tear
down faith is also trying to sortof convince you that, you know what?
You come across something thatyou haven't heard before, that
means everything is wrong.
What Adam Grant is suggesting is you comeacross something that you haven't heard
before, that doesn't necessarily meanwhat you believe is wrong, but you might
(09:32):
need to re-examine your assumptions aboutthose things and wonder if your thinking
has been right along the way and if youneed to change your thinking a little bit.
Scott Woodward (09:41):
Yeah.
You know, Elder Uchtdorf, in anothertalk he gave, it's a little phrase
that's made some headway in thechurch, which is, “Doubt your doubts
before you doubt your faith.” Wecould even use the word assumptions.
Doubt your assumptionsbefore you doubt your faith.
Like, you might have some blind spots.
And that's okay.
That's what this skill is all about, isrethinking your blind spots: Rethinking
what you thought you knew, but in lightof new information, being able to adjust.
(10:05):
Being nimble and having somedexterity there with your thinking.
Okay, here's another quote fromAdam Grant that goes along that.
He said, “We all have blind spotsin our knowledge and opinion.
The bad news is that they can leaveus blind to our blindness, which gives
us false confidence in our judgmentand prevents us from rethinking.
The good news is that with theright kind of confidence we
(10:25):
can learn to see ourselves moreclearly and update our views.
In driver's training we weretaught to identify our visual
blind spots and eliminate them withthe help of mirrors and sensors.
In life, since our minds don'tcome equipped with those tools,
we need to learn to recognize ourcognitive blind spots and revise
our thinking accordingly.” So good.
So good.
Casey Paul Griffiths (10:44):
Mm-hmm.
Scott Woodward (10:45):
That's what we need to do.
That's what we want to talk about today.
How do you do that, especiallyin a context of learning church
history, studying this topic,which frankly some people are a
little bit nervous about, right?
Some people are afraid what they mightlearn in church history and what might
challenge their thinking, maybe evencause doubts in their testimony, right?
I guess we're here to say today that ifyou can develop this skill, that's going
(11:07):
to be a much less likely outcome, right?
That you're going to somehow be blindsidedby some fact in church history that's
going to cause your testimony to crumble.
That doesn't happen when you comeat it with the right mindset,
the right skill set, I would say.
Casey Paul Griffiths (11:21):
Yeah.
This is an interesting word thatAdam Grant uses is humility.
Scott Woodward (11:27):
Yeah.
I like that word.
Casey Paul Griffiths: Here's another quote. (11:28):
undefined
He says, “As we gain experience,we lose some of our humility and
have a false sense of mastery.
We get trapped in a beginner's bubble offlawed assumptions, and we're ignorant
of our own ignorance.” Then he introducesthis phrase: he says, “Confident
humility,” which sounds like an oxymoron,right, “gives us enough doubt to reexamine
(11:49):
our old knowledge and enough confidenceto pursue new insights.” And so we're
saying have the humility to say, I couldhave been wrong in the way I saw this,
but be confident to say, I think if Ire-examine this, it's going to help me.
It's going to make me a better person.
We're all seeking the truth here.
And every once in a while agood reevaluation of how we see
(12:12):
things can be really helpful.
It makes us be more flexible.
Scott Woodward (12:16):
Yeah.
Okay.
Should we practice?
Should we dive in and should we try touse this skill with some church history
and kind of show how it can play out?
Maybe use examples of people in churchhistory who either did a good job or
(12:40):
a bad job at being mentally flexible?
Casey Paul Griffiths (12:43):
Yeah, so here's some case scenarios.
We're going to start with aguy named Joseph Wakefield.
Scott Woodward (12:48):
Okay.
Who's Joseph Wakefield?
Casey Paul Griffiths (12:50):
Joseph Wakefield is an elder in the early church.
He's briefly mentioned in Doctrineand Covenants 52 verse 35, and he
was called to accompany a wholegroup of missionaries that were going
to travel from Ohio to Missouri.
Now, one of the people heconverts is actually George A.
Smith.
This is grandfather of theprophet George Albert Smith.
Scott Woodward (13:12):
He's the namesake of St.
George, isn't he?
St.
George, Utah is—this is George A.
Smith.
Casey Paul Griffiths (13:16):
He is, yeah.
He's all over southern Utah, andhe becomes the church historian.
And George A.
Smith was a brilliant historian becausehe was great at picking out these little
nuggets that kind of taught principles.
Again, this is the guy thatconverted him, but I'll spoil
the end of the story for you.
Joseph Wakefield leaves the church.
But here's what George A.
(13:37):
Smith says is the reason why he left.
Okay, this is in the Journal ofDiscourses, volume 7, page 112.
He said, “Joseph H.
Wakefield, who baptized me, after havingapostatized from the church announced
to the astonished world the fact that,while he was a guest in the house of
Joseph Smith, he had absolutely seen theprophet come down from the room where he
(13:58):
was engaged in translating the word ofGod,” this is the Bible translation, “and
actually go to playing with the children.
This convinced him the prophet was nota man of God and that the work was false
which to me, and hundreds of others, hehad testified that he knew came from God.
He afterwards headed a mob meetingand took the lead in bringing about
a persecution against the saints inKirtland and the regions round about.”
Scott Woodward (14:21):
Wow.
Casey Paul Griffiths (14:22):
So Joseph Wakefield apostatized because he saw
Joseph Smith playing with some children.
Scott Woodward (14:28):
Okay.
So, alright.
So he left the church because he sawthe prophet playing with children.
And he's going to lead mobs againstthe church as a result of his apostasy.
Casey Paul Griffiths (14:39):
Yeah.
Scott Woodward (14:40):
Okay, so let's walk through.
What are the mental moves you wouldmake if you're applying this skill
set or mindset of mental flexibility?
So mental move number one here isfirst, real simply, just identify
the assumptions, all right?
Casey Paul Griffiths (14:55):
Mm-hmm.
Scott Woodward (14:55):
All right, Casey, what are Joseph Wakefield's
assumptions about prophets here?
Casey Paul Griffiths (15:02):
I mean, it seems like the guy thinks that
prophets can't play with children.
Scott Woodward (15:06):
Yeah.
Casey Paul Griffiths (15:06):
That prophets are always serious and sober and
. . . Scott Woodward: Solemn.
Solemn.
Because this onemystifies me a little bit.
Like, what, what's the big deal?
You know?
Scott Woodward (15:18):
What's the big deal?
Casey Paul Griffiths (15:19):
But I guess, yeah, that's his assumption
to be a solemn, distant figure and doesn'tdo stuff like wrestle with kids or, you
know, play games or something like that.
Scott Woodward (15:29):
Yeah.
God's work will not be led bymen who play with children.
And since Joseph plays with children,he must not be a prophet of God, and
therefore this isn't the work of God.
Or something like that, right?
Okay, okay, so that'smental move number one.
You've got to—let's be reallyclear about assumptions.
So mental move number two now is nowchallenge the assumption, usually
(15:50):
against one of the best books.
I always start with scripture.
Let's challenge the assumption.
The way that Adam Grant asksit, he says, “How do you know?
It's a question we need to ask moreoften, both of ourselves and of others.
The power lies in its frankness.
It's non-judgmental, astraightforward expression of doubt
and curiosity that doesn't putpeople on the defensive, right?
(16:11):
So ask yourself, ask others,like, how do you know?
Let's challenge the assumption.
Are these assumptions true,Joseph Wakefield, or not?
And I don't know, as I think about it,as I look at the best books, Casey,
I can't find anything in scripture oranywhere else that would disqualify
a man from being a true prophet ofGod because he plays with children,
especially his own children, right?
Casey Paul Griffiths (16:29):
Yeah, this is weird because, I mean, I can't find any place
where it says the Savior played games withchildren, but the Savior loved children
and blessed children and didn't seem tohave any problem being in their presence.
Scott Woodward (16:42):
“Suffer the children to come unto me, for of
such is the kingdom of God.” Yeah.
Casey Paul Griffiths (16:47):
Yeah.
It feels like JosephWakefield's assumptions may
have been opposed to scripture.
At the very least, scripture doesn'tsay that they can't play with children.
The prophets can't let loose and do alittle stickpull or something like that.
Scott Woodward (17:01):
Right?
Yeah, certainly not.
Okay, so that then leads to mentalmove number three, which is modify your
assumption in light of the new informationafter a humble and honest analysis, right?
You go to the scriptures, startwith the best books—scripture.
Is there anything there thatwould prevent a prophet of God
from wrestling with children?
You know what?
Upon humble analysis, no, there's not.
(17:21):
So Joseph Wakefield would havebeen helped by looking maybe at the
humanity of prophets in scripture.
Again, there's nothing that disqualifiesa prophet from doing normal, human
things like Joseph was doing.
The sad news in this case is Wakefielddid not modify his assumption,
and so he apostatized and thenturns to fight against the work.
So here's the thing (17:40):
When your assumptions about God, prophets, or
the church are violated by reality,now your faith is in jeopardy.
In this case, the reality wasJoseph plays with his children.
At that moment, Joseph Wakefield'sfaith was in jeopardy because
his assumption was violated.
So now this puts you at a crossroads,and you now have essentially two
choices (18:00):
Number one, throw out everything you believe about God,
prophets, and the church, or, numbertwo, recognize that you could be wrong.
You might have a blind spot.
And now, be a seeker, and go back tosources of truth, go back to the best
books, and reexamine your expectationsagainst the truth of the Word of God, and
then modify your assumptions accordingly.
(18:23):
And now you're in a place where whena prophet plays with his children,
that does nothing to your faith.
In fact, that actually iskind of endearing, right?
The way that Jesus in 3 Nephi 17 and otherplaces, when he's tender with children,
rather than being faith damaging, itkind of becomes faith strengthening.
Casey Paul Griffiths (18:38):
Agreed.
This is maybe the extreme exampleof mental inflexibility, right?
Who was this guy, and what's his deal?
Let's try maybe a harder one.
Scott Woodward (18:50):
Okay.
Casey Paul Griffiths: So example number two. (19:03):
undefined
Scott, tell us about Ezra Booth.
Scott Woodward (19:06):
Okay, Ezra Booth.
This man joined the church in May of1831 when he saw, with his own eyes,
the prophet Joseph Smith heal the lamearm of a woman named Elsa Johnson.
This is John Johnson's wife.
They'll have a couple kids who becomeapostles, Luke and Lyman Johnson.
Like, great family up in Hiram, Ohio.
So after his conversion, Booth, alongwith other missionaries, were called and
(19:30):
sent to Missouri in the summer of 1831.
Now, Booth becomes upset abouthaving to walk and preach the entire
journey from Ohio to Missouri.
And he began to criticize and findfault with the leadership of the
church, especially Joseph Smith.
And then when he actually arrivesin Missouri, he's disappointed
at not experiencing miraculousmanifestations of the spirit of Zion.
(19:52):
Instead he only saw churchleaders unimpressively lay a
small stone and a shrub oak as thecornerstone and foundation of Zion.
Ezra was not impressed.
This little cornerstone ceremony wasdone in a little dedicatory service
of the land in a spot for the temple.
And then the church leadersannounced that it was time to turn
(20:13):
around and return back to Ohio.
So shortly after his return toOhio, Elder Booth came out as an
apostate, Joseph Smith recorded.
I'll continue to quote Joseph Smithhere: he said, “He came into the
church upon seeing a person healed ofan infirmity of many years standing.
He went up to Missouri as a missionary,but when he actually learned that faith,
humility, patience, and tribulation gobefore blessing, and that God brings
(20:37):
low before He exalts, that instead ofthe Savior’s granting him power to smite
men and make them believe, as he said hewanted God to do in his own case, then
he was disappointed and turned away andbecame an apostate.” So there you go.
That's Ezra's sad story.
And he'll actually continueto fight against the church.
He'll write several news articleswhich tear down confidence in Joseph
(20:59):
Smith, Sidney Rigdon, and others.
Sidney Rigdon will actually challenge himto a public debate, to which Ezra does not
show up, but he continues to be a littlebit of a thorn in the side of church
leaders there for a short amount of timeafter his apostasy through publishing.
In fact, I think he publishes the firstanti-Mormon material, doesn't he, Casey?
Casey Paul Griffiths (21:18):
He publishes some of the first anti-Mormon material, and
here's a unique thing about Ezra Booth.
There's actually a section of theDoctrine and Covenants dedicated
to Ezra Booth telling thembasically to go out and rebuke him.
Scott Woodward (21:31):
Yeah, yeah.
Casey Paul Griffiths (21:32):
And so that’s got to be a little special, you know, to be the
first person who the Lord publicly says,you've got to go out and rebuke this guy.
This is section 71—
Scott Woodward (21:43):
Yeah.
Casey Paul Griffiths (21:43):
—of the Doctrine and Covenants, where the
Lord says, “Confound your enemies.”He's talking about Ezra Booth.
“Call upon them to meet you,both in public and in private.
Inasmuch as you're faithful, theirshame shall be made manifest.
Wherefore, let them bring theirstrong reasons against the Lord.
Verily, thus saith the Lord untoyou, there is no weapon formed
against you that shall prosper.”
Scott Woodward (22:02):
That's what led Sidney to calling him out, right?
He actually gives a public notice,like, I hereby call Ezra Booth and
Symonds Rider was the other guy—
Casey Paul Griffiths (22:08):
Yeah.
Scott Woodward (22:09):
—to come and answer their claims against Joseph and the Book of
Mormon and the church, especially the Bookof Mormon, and Sidney wants to go toe to
toe and debate that, but it's because theLord backed him up and said, yeah, let
them bring forth their strong reasons.
Let's do this.
Casey Paul Griffiths (22:21):
Yep.
Bring it on So let's talk about—boy,there's a lot to unpack here, and Ezra
Booth is a fascinating figure, but—
Scott Woodward (22:29):
Yeah.
Casey Paul Griffiths (22:29):
—a couple things
Scott Woodward (22:32):
Yeah.
Casey Paul Griffiths (22:33):
—which the Lord warns against several times
in the Doctrine and Covenants,you know, he that seeketh a sign.
But it seems like one of Ezra'sassumptions was that there would be
stuff like Elsa Johnson's healinghappening all the time in the church.
And actually, there was a lot ofstuff that happened in the early
church, but to assume that it wasgoing to be stuff like that every
(22:53):
day might be a wrong assumption.
Scott Woodward (22:56):
Yeah.
He seemed to believe that prophetswere supposed to be, like,
constantly impressive, right?
That when he gets to Zion and seesJoseph Smith and Sidney Rigdon laying
a very unimpressive cornerstonein Zion and having a shrub oak as
part of the ceremony, he's like,okay, this is not impressive.
So his assumption’s violatedthere, it looks like.
Casey Paul Griffiths (23:18):
Yeah.
And he must have assumed that Zionwas going to, you know, magically
appear without any—one of the thingsEzra Booth writes about is that Joseph
Smith and Edward Partridge got into anargument over the right plot of land.
He must have assumed that therewouldn't be any intense discussions
about the location of Zion.
Scott Woodward (23:38):
Edward Partridge thought the land wasn't very impressive, right?
If I remember the argument, Joseph says.
No, this is the spot.
You need a little more faith, brother.
Ezra didn't like that.
Casey Paul Griffiths (23:49):
It also seems like he just complained a lot.
He thought the missionarywork would be easier.
And to his credit, he travels allthe way from Ohio to Missouri.
That's a long journey and a toughjourney, but it seems like Ezra
just wasn't really—this wasn'twhat he signed up for, right?
He's feeling like it would be easy toteach people, it wouldn't require a
(24:10):
lot of work, and that's kind of whatcauses him to become disillusioned.
Scott Woodward (24:14):
You should be able to smite men and make them believe.
That's what Joseph saidthat Ezra said, right?
He wanted to be able to do amiracle and make people believe.
Kind of makes sense, consideringhow he came into the church, but
he wanted to be, again, impressive.
He wanted to be really impressive andmiraculous as a missionary, but most
missionary work, as most of us knowwho serve missions, is not glorious.
(24:36):
It's kind of tedious, with theoccasional breakthrough, and other
than that, it's a lot of sweat and alot of hard work and a lot of normal,
mundane, difficult days, right?
That's the reality.
Casey Paul Griffiths (24:49):
It's a lot less glorious than we
sometimes assume it will be.
Scott Woodward (24:53):
Than Ezra thought it would be.
Yeah.
Sometimes we have that same assumption.
Casey Paul Griffiths (24:57):
Right.
Scott Woodward (24:57):
So you just did mental move number one.
We identified his assumptions, right?
So, okay, so mental move numbertwo with this skill set is, okay,
now challenge the assumption,usually against scripture here.
What do you think, Casey?
Are those assumptions true inany degree, and why or why not?
Casey Paul Griffiths (25:11):
Well, I mean, we just already talked about one.
It's not easy, right?
Scott Woodward (25:16):
Yeah.
Casey Paul Griffiths (25:16):
And secondly, there's a kind of down to earth,
when it comes to building Zion,mental leap that we have to make.
Building Zion happens in a thousandlittle ways every single day.
It can be something as mundane asrolling a rock up against a scrub oak.
You have to start somewhere, right?
But it seems like the big issueEzra was having was he just
(25:38):
expected stuff like Elsa Johnson'shealing to happen every day.
The scriptures seem to identify miraclesas being the exception and not the rule.
Several sections in the Doctrine andCovenants, the Savior warns against
seeking signs, that signs come afterwe've demonstrated faith, and not before.
(25:58):
And it seems in Ezra's case that hemixed up the process, that his faith
came from seeing something miraculous,and it's not supposed to work that way.
You're supposed to demonstratefaith, and then the miracles come.
So I would say a lot of hisassumptions don't really line up
with the scriptures or the waythings work as we understand them.
Scott Woodward (26:17):
So then mental move number three, modify the assumption
in light of new informationafter humble and honest analysis.
Yeah, for Ezra Booth to have goneto the scriptures and looking
at, okay, what do we learn aboutmissionary work from scripture, right?
Let's just take Paul as an examplein scripture as a missionary.
Like, what do we learn?
What assumptions could we build outabout missionary work from looking
(26:40):
at Paul's own efforts, right?
One of the greatestmissionaries in scripture.
I'm reminded of what Paul himself saysabout his own missionary efforts in 2nd
Corinthians 11, for instance, where hesaid, “Of the Jews five times received
I forty stripes save one.” Five times Iwas beaten thirty-nine times on my back.
“Thrice was I beaten with rods.
Once was I stoned.
(27:01):
Thrice I suffered shipwreck.
A night and a day have I been in the deep,in the ocean, in journeyings often, in
perils of waters, in perils of robbers,in perils of my own countrymen, in
perils by the heathen, in perils in thecity, in perils in the wilderness, in
perils in the sea, in perils among falsebrethren, in weariness and painfulness
and watchings often and hunger and thirst,fasting often and cold and nakedness.”
(27:25):
I'm getting the vibe from Paul thatsometimes missionary work is hard.
Casey Paul Griffiths (27:29):
Yeah.
Scott Woodward (27:30):
And sometimes it's—people don't like you, and
sometimes it's going to be unglorious.
Casey Paul Griffiths (27:36):
Yeah.
Scott Woodward (27:36):
So if Ezra Booth could have reexamined his assumptions
in light of scripture, could havegone to the Book of Mormon, looked
at the sons of Mosiah, missionarywork there, not always glorious.
Some moments, yes.
Some moments.
But not generally.
It's not just filled withmiracle after miracle, right?
It's not an unbroken chain of miracles.
Casey Paul Griffiths (27:52):
Mm-hmm.
Scott Woodward (27:53):
It's often hard with moments of breakthrough.
Casey Paul Griffiths (27:57):
The other thing I would add there, too, is from the
life of Paul, we'd also learn thatprophets get into arguments, you know?
Paul and Barnabas have a bigol’ argument over whether or
not Mark should come with them.
And it's apparently so severethat they part ways, that these
two mission companions justcan't even with each other.
Scott Woodward (28:16):
Or Galatians 2, where Paul calls out Peter for fraternizing too much
with the Jews instead of the Gentiles.
Casey Paul Griffiths (28:23):
The Judaizers.
Scott Woodward (28:24):
Yeah, yeah.
Casey Paul Griffiths (28:25):
So, I mean, it seems like Ezra had sort of, I'm
not going to say deified, but maybeglorified the idea of a prophet too much.
And when he saw the prophet actingas a human, you know, getting into
arguments with his friends or travelingunder unpleasant circumstances,
it just didn't work for him.
Scott Woodward (28:42):
Yeah.
Casey Paul Griffiths (28:43):
And so he's confronted with two choices.
Throw out everything you believeabout God, prophets, and the
church, or recognize you could bewrong and update your assumptions.
Prophets are human.
Scott Woodward (28:52):
Yeah.
Casey Paul Griffiths: Building Zion is a process. (28:52):
undefined
Missionary work is hard.
You adjust all those things, and you'regoing to be okay, but it seems like he
just really couldn't make the adjustment.
Scott Woodward (29:03):
Of the two choices that you're basically confronted with
when your assumptions are violated,he chose to throw out everything he
believed about God, prophets, andthe church rather than, as you said,
recognizing that he could be wrong.
Rather than being a seeker.
Rather than going back to sources oftruth, the best books, to reexamine
his expectations against the truthof the word of God and modifying
(29:23):
his assumptions accordingly.
So Ezra Booth is a sad tale of whathappens when you don't employ the skill
set of mental flexibility and you'recaught in the trap of fixed thinking.
He's a victim of fixed thinking.
Casey Paul Griffiths (29:49):
All right.
For example number three, thisis a hypothetical example.
This is not a real person.
Scott Woodward (29:54):
Okay.
Casey Paul Griffiths (29:55):
Modern example.
Okay.
So this person, we'regoing to call him Ryan.
Scott Woodward (29:59):
Okay.
Casey Paul Griffiths (29:59):
This isn't based on any person we know, okay?
I know you have a brother named Ryan.
This isn't him.
Scott Woodward (30:04):
I have a brother named Ryan.
Yeah.
Ryan, this is not about you.
Okay.
Casey Paul Griffiths (30:07):
Yeah.
Ryan stumbled across a website criticalof the church, which pointed out that
when modern Egyptologists examinefacsimiles one, two, and three in our
Book of Abraham, they interpret themvery differently than Joseph Smith did.
The facsimiles, they say, really havenothing to do with Abraham, but are an
ancient embalming scene, facsimile 1;a buried hypocephalus, facsimile 2; and
(30:29):
a judgment scene from the 125th chapterof the Book of the Dead, facsimile 3.
The website points out that this is solidevidence that Joseph Smith was wrong about
the facsimiles and is therefore a fraud.
Ryan is floored by this informationand unable to reconcile how
Joseph could be wrong about thisand still be a true prophet.
He feels his testimony is disintegrating.
Scott Woodward (30:51):
Okay, so you said this is a hypothetical example.
Casey Paul Griffiths (30:54):
Yeah.
Scott Woodward (30:54):
But honestly this, like, totally happens, like,
all the time to people, right?
Casey Paul Griffiths (30:58):
Mm-hmm.
Scott Woodward (30:58):
Coming across information online, your assumptions are
violated, now what are you going to do?
What are you going to do?
Right.
Should we break it down?
Casey Paul Griffiths (31:06):
Let's break it down.
Scott Woodward (31:08):
Mental move number one.
Let's identify the assumptions.
I feel like there's a lot in here.
I feel like Ryan has someassumptions about Joseph Smith in
here, Joseph's translation process.
What else?
Modern Egyptologists’ conclusions—howabout the conclusions of the
website he's reading from?
So maybe let's break down all of those.
So let's start with Joseph Smith.
What are his assumptionsabout Joseph Smith?
(31:30):
Ryan seems to think that JosephSmith's interpretations of the Book
of Abraham must agree with those ofmodern Egyptologists in order for his
translation to be considered valid.
Maybe that's one assumption.
His assumption aboutJoseph's translation process?
He seems to think that Joseph eithertranslated the papyri using the
same process modern Egyptologistsuse today, or at least he should
(31:51):
have arrived at the same conclusionsthat modern Egyptologists come to,
regardless of his translation process.
What else?
Ryan seems to think that modernEgyptologists’ literal interpretation
should be considered the final word onthe meaning of the papyri, maybe, and
should be the standard against whichJoseph Smith's translations are measured.
At one level seems veryreasonable, very rational.
(32:12):
I don't have a ton of problems withthat, but that can be dangerous.
We'll talk about why here in a second.
And then Ryan seems to think that thewebsite he's reading from is giving
him the unfiltered, untarnished truthand that there's no other way to
responsibly interpret the evidence.
Anything you'd add?
Casey Paul Griffiths (32:29):
No, that's a pretty good summary of the assumptions
a person might make in this situation.
If that's the case, then let'schallenge Ryan's assumptions here.
Scott Woodward (32:38):
Okay.
Casey Paul Griffiths (32:38):
Are they too rigid?
Are they too narrow?
Scott Woodward (32:41):
Yeah, we did a series about this, didn't we?
Casey Paul Griffiths (32:43):
Yeah, we did.
Scott Woodward (32:44):
This was in our Translations and Revelations series.
We went through, I think, two episodestalking about this very point that,
yeah, when you actually look in thebest books written by those who are
Egyptologists—we highlighted KerryMuhlestein, his little book, Let's
Talk About the Book of Abraham.
He does a great job talking about whateyewitnesses say the sources were that
(33:07):
Joseph was translating from, and it alwaysseems to be consistent that it was a long
roll which we no longer have, destroyedin the Chicago Fire of 1871, most likely.
And all we have left are elevenlittle fragments that were sent a
different way to the MetropolitanMuseum of Art in New York and came
to our knowledge in the 1960s.
(33:28):
And so according to eyewitnessaccounts Joseph isn't translating from
those fragments, as far as we know.
Casey Paul Griffiths (33:34):
Yeah.
Scott Woodward (33:35):
But what we did point out is, the thing that is
challenging, though, is it does seemlike Joseph translates a little.
Like on facsimile one, you have littlenumbers, facsimile two, there's little
numbers, facsimile three, there's littlenumbers, and when you look at those
numbers and there's a little explanation,at least, in English underneath
them, which seems to be an effort attranslation, and when modern Egyptologists
(33:55):
look at those facsimiles, they say,that's not what those are about, right?
So, let's go to mental movenumber three on this, then.
So how would you modify your assumptionin light of new information here
after a humble and honest analysis?
If you go to the best books on this,which might not, in this case, be
scripture (34:10):
It might be scholarship by someone like Kerry Muhlestein or John
Gee or Stephen Smoot or John Thompson.
Like, what information might behelpful here for Ryan to think
more clearly through this issueand then adjust his assumptions?
Casey Paul Griffiths (34:26):
So, first, I mean, we talked about all of this on
our Book of Abraham podcast, but oneassumption that we make is that the
drawings can only mean one thing.
Scott Woodward (34:36):
Right.
Casey Paul Griffiths (34:37):
Egyptian Jews, Jewish people living in
Egypt, sometimes repurposed Egyptiansymbology for their own purposes.
So the facsimiles in the book ofAbraham are an example of visual
iconography that can sometimesbe used for different reasons.
And when you think about that for aminute, we use different symbols to
represent different things all the time.
(34:58):
Is that the case, when Joseph Smithinterpreted the facsimiles, that he was
giving the way one group may have usedthe symbols and not worrying about another
group, how they might've used the symbols.
Scott Woodward (35:10):
And what's particularly convincing in this case is that the
area that these papyri were discoveredis a place called Thebes, Egypt, right?
About second century BC.
And what modern Egyptologists have foundis that some Jews living in that area
would repurpose Egyptian drawings likethe facsimiles to tell stories about the
(35:32):
Old Testament people such as Abraham.
We've actually found evidence ofthem using facsimiles that were not
originally intended to talk aboutAbraham, like lion couch scene, right,
of Facsimile 1, and using those toactually tell stories about Abraham.
There's actually a cool exampleof that that has been found.
And so, on that level, JosephSmith's interpretation is spot on.
(35:55):
It's a booyah.
So this borrowing from each other andgiving secondary meanings to Egyptian
hieroglyphics can easily account forthe disagreement between what modern
Egyptologists say the fragments mean,which is the original Egyptian meaning,
and then what Joseph Smith interpretedthem to mean, which is that secondary
meaning that was applied to hieroglyphsat that time where those scrolls
(36:15):
were found in the second century B.
C., right, to tell Abraham's story.
That's actually a really cool find thatwas discovered after Joseph Smith's death,
which is all the more cool, actually.
Casey Paul Griffiths (36:25):
Yeah.
Scott Woodward (36:26):
What else?
What else might help Ryan?
Casey Paul Griffiths (36:28):
Oh, Ryan might make some assumptions about
the website he's reading from, too.
If you're assuming that everythingyou read on the internet is accurate,
you could run into some bad roads.
And we talked about this when we talkedabout historicity, but consider the
motives behind the people that write it.
You know, if someone writes toodefinitively, if someone is basically
(36:50):
saying this is the way it is andthere's no other way to look at this
and interpret it, that's sometimes asign of bad thinking, I guess you'd say.
Scott Woodward (36:59):
Yeah.
Rigid thinking.
Casey Paul Griffiths: Rigid thinking, right? (37:00):
undefined
That it has to be this way, andtherefore you have to do this.
So that could be a problem as well.
It's just assuming that something you'veread on the internet without checking
it out a little bit is good information.
Scott Woodward (37:16):
And we talked about, too, the difference between
a fact and an inference on a fact.
Like, the facts of the case hereare, let's just review, that, yes,
modern Egyptologists interpret thefacsimiles different than Joseph Smith.
That is a fact.
But the website that Ryan ran into theninferred from that fact that Joseph Smith
(37:36):
was therefore a fraud and a false prophet.
That's an inference.
That's not the fact.
And what we're trying to do herewith looking deeper into some of the
best books is see if there's not moreinformation, better information that
can help us make sense of those facts.
We've just given an exampleof how that is the case.
The repurposing of facsimiles isactually super cool and very helpful.
(37:58):
That does not lead you to the necessaryconclusion that Joseph is a fraud here,
but actually leads you to a conclusionthat's, like, how on earth could Joseph
have known that facsimiles like that wererepurposed to tell Abraham's stories when
nobody knew that until after he died?
Like, suddenly that becomes somethingthat is faith strengthening rather
than faith destroying, right?
(38:18):
Just keep digging.
Keep seeking into the bestbooks, the best scholars.
Like, people have wrestled with this.
What have they found?
What have they learned, right?
So, Ryan would be very well served,like we all would, of recognizing
the difference between the factsof the matter and then inference
about those facts based on one'sassumptions and your hermeneutic, right?
(38:39):
The hermeneutic of suspicionhere is Egyptologists disagree
with Joseph, therefore, boom.
Joseph is false prophet.
Like, that's a hermeneutic ofsuspicion that's not challenging
their own assumptions.
Casey Paul Griffiths (38:48):
Yeah.
Scott Woodward (38:49):
The mindset of mental flexibility here is so crucial to
keep the options open and dig deeper,especially on this particular one, because
the answer is not obvious here, right?
The answer is not obvious.
You're not just going tobe like, oh, that's easy.
The answer's actually super cool once youget into it, but Ryan, hold on your way.
All the Ryans out there, when youcome across something like that
(39:09):
that just seems irreconcilable, justknow that that's an opportunity for
deeper seeking, deeper learning.
Keep your mind open andflexible, and resolution almost
always comes in those cases.
Casey Paul Griffiths (39:22):
In this situation, I would hope Ryan
also wouldn't panic, basically.
You know, sometimes when we'represented with new material that we
haven't heard of before, the impulseis to immediately act on it, to throw
everything out, when in reality, whenyou come across something, you can just
say, I haven't encountered that before.
Let me look into it a little bit, andusually, after a little bit of searching,
(39:44):
you'll find out that it wasn't—it'snew to you; it wasn't new to everybody.
And there are answersand way to reconcile it.
The facsimiles in the book of Abraham area great example, because it's always used
as a gotcha by people that want to destroyfaith, but when you start looking into it
deeper, and you start to understand thecultural context and everything that's
happening, like you mentioned, it actuallycan become something that deepens your
(40:07):
faith rather than harming your faith.
So I would say, you know, don't panic.
Realize you're at a crossroads,and it might change the way that
you think about prophets and howprophets carry out their work, but
it doesn't mean you have to throwout everything that's been meaningful
and powerful and beautiful to you.
Scott Woodward (40:25):
Ryan, here you are.
You're at the crossroads, right?
When your assumptions arebeing violated by reality here,
your faith is in jeopardy.
What are you going to do, brother?
You got two choices.
Throw out everything you believeabout God, prophets, and the church,
or recognize you could be wrong.
The website could bewrong that you're reading.
Be a seeker.
Go to sources of truth, the best books,whatever is the best source to get real,
(40:49):
solid answers to this particular issue,then re-examine your expectations against
the truth that you're finding, and thenmodify your assumptions accordingly.
And like you said, you mightcome out of that experience
thinking of prophets differently.
That's okay, as long as thatmatches reality better, right?
I don't think of prophets the same asI thought about them when I was 10,
or when I was 20, or when I was 30.
(41:09):
Like, I continue to modify myassumptions about prophets, but I
can boldly stand up and testify thatthey actually are prophets of God.
Totally believe Josephis a prophet of God.
That means something different to me nowthan it did when I was 17, but it's sweet,
and it's rich, and to me it's beautiful.
Casey Paul Griffiths: And that's a good thing. (41:25):
undefined
That shows that you're mentallyflexible enough that you can grow.
You haven't locked yourself into one wayof thinking, so when new information comes
along, it's not going to totally breakyour framework that you exist within.
Scott Woodward (41:38):
I hope so.
Casey Paul Griffiths (41:51):
Well, we used two negative examples and then one
hypothetical, I hope this turnsout okay for Ryan, kind of example.
Scott Woodward (41:57):
Yeah.
Good luck, Ryan.
Casey Paul Griffiths (41:58):
Is there a good example of flexible thinking
that we could model here, too?
Like, someone from church historywho came across a difficult problem
and did okay, and who is that?
Scott Woodward (42:09):
Yes.
Let me set the scene here.
In Kirtland, Ohio, 1837, JosephSmith and other church leaders, but
especially Joseph, endorsed a bank.
They called it the KirtlandSafety Society, which a
lot of members invested in.
Then, in what's known asthe Panic of 1837 in the U.
S., about 40 percent of banksacross America failed, including the
(42:32):
Kirtland Safety Society, and a lot ofchurch members lost a lot of money.
A lot of people looked at JosephSmith as the failure there, that
he was the one who was to blame.
Just to empathize a little bit, can youimagine the prophet of God stands up in
general conference and says, hey, we'regoing to endorse a bank, and we'd invite
you to invest your money in this bank.
And, I mean, I think a lot ofchurch members would do it.
(42:54):
And then imagine that that bank failed ayear later and you lost all your money.
Casey Paul Griffiths (43:00):
Hmm.
Scott Woodward (43:01):
How would that make you view the president of the church?
You might pause and say,hold on a second, right?
And I bet you'll find anassumption buried in your heart.
I think your assumption wouldgo something like this: True
prophets don't make financialerrors like that that hurt people.
True prophets don'tendorse banks that fail.
There might be an assumptionin your heart like that, right?
(43:22):
So our good example today is aman by the name of Brigham Young.
Maybe you've heard of him.
And here's what's coolabout Brigham Young.
Watch what he does here (43:30):
Let me read a quote from him.
He told this story later.
It's Journal of Discourses,volume 4, page 297-298.
He said this, “I can tell the peoplethat once in my life I felt a want
of confidence, a lack of confidencein brother Joseph Smith soon after
I became acquainted with him.
It was not concerning religious matters.
(43:51):
It was not about his revelations, but itwas in relation to his financiering, to
his managing the temporal affairs which heundertook.” Now, I'm not sure, by the way,
if this is about the Kirtland bank failingor not, or some other financial issue.
This could be aboutthat, but I'm not sure.
He's a little vague, but what he saw wasJoseph is not great at managing finances.
(44:13):
That was the reality that BrighamYoung was now confronted with.
I'll continue to quote him, “A feelingcame over me that Joseph was not right
in his financial management, though Ipresume the feeling did not last sixty
seconds and perhaps not thirty, but thatfeeling came on me once and once only
from the time I first knew him to the dayof his death.” So let's slow down here.
(44:34):
Here's an assumption that might havebeen in Brigham Young's heart: True
prophets don't make financial errors.
The reality he was confrontedwith was, I see Joseph Smith
making some financial errors.
Brigham Young is nowconfronted with a choice.
He can either throw out everythinghe believes about God, prophets, and
the church, or, watch what he does.
He says, “I repented of my unbelief,and that too very suddenly.
(44:57):
I repented about as quickly as I committedthe error.” And here's why: He said,
“It was not for me to question whetherJoseph was dictated by the Lord at all
times and under all circumstances or not.
He was called of God.
God dictated him.
And if God had a mind to leave Josephto himself and let him commit an
error, that was no business of mine.
(45:19):
It was not my prerogativeto call him in question with
regard to any act of his life.
He was God's servant, not mine.” Whoo.
So good, right?
Brigham Young's saying, listen, thereality I'm confronted with here is
Joseph Smith's making financial errors.
Now, what do I want to do about that?
Well, why can't God let hisprophet make financial errors?
Casey Paul Griffiths (45:42):
Mm-hmm.
Scott Woodward (45:43):
See what he did there really quick?
What'd he say?
60 seconds, maybe 30 secondshe was wrestling with that, and
then he came to that conclusion.
Casey Paul Griffiths (45:48):
Yeah.
Scott Woodward (45:48):
God can let him make financial errors if he wants to.
It's up to God whether he's goingto correct Joseph on this or not.
So there you go.
Maybe my assumption was wrong.
Prophets don't make financial errors.
You know what?
Why can't they make financial errors?
Of course they can.
It's God's prophet, not mine.
God can let them do that if He wants.
So good to just watch BrighamYoung just kind of wrestle with
(46:08):
that in 30 seconds or maybe 60.
Casey Paul Griffiths (46:11):
Mm-hmm.
Scott Woodward (46:11):
Others were not so fortunate.
Others got super angry at Joseph.
Some left for a while and came back, andothers left and never come back during
this season of this fallout with the bank,which precipitates the Kirtland apostasy,
we call it, because so many people leftthe church over dissatisfaction with
Joseph Smith, but not Brigham Young.
(46:32):
Not Brigham Young.
And that's a little glimpse into hissoul, a little glimpse into his mind, his
mental flexibility as he kind of wrestledwith Joseph making financial errors.
So, super cool.
Casey Paul Griffiths (46:44):
Very cool.
It kind of shows, you know,how he approached it with
the hermeneutic of faith.
He didn't go in lookingfor anything wrong.
When he sees something wrong, headjusts his thinking to say, is
this really part of being a prophet?
Is financiering always partof the prophetic office?
Scott Woodward (47:00):
Yeah.
Casey Paul Griffiths (47:00):
And even if he was wrong in how he did his
finance, he's still a prophet.
Scott Woodward (47:05):
Yeah.
Casey Paul Griffiths (47:06):
This really isn't my business.
This isn't something I have to expenda lot of mental energy worrying about.
So it's a great model of how you canconfront a problem and rather than
having your whole world shatter,you just pause and say, well, let
me think about this for a second.
Maybe my thinking was wrong, andif I adjust, I can find a way to
(47:26):
reconcile this, and most of the timeyou will find a way to reconcile it.
Scott Woodward (47:30):
Yeah.
And he didn't go to the other extreme,trying to be like, nope, Joseph didn't
make any mistakes, you know, try todefend the prophet tooth and nail,
like try to uphold some false standardof prophetic infallibility, right?
He's just like, oh,prophets can make mistakes.
That's fine.
If this is one of them, cool.
I'll let God deal with it.
Not my bag.
So just a nice sweet spot offaith, but not fanaticism.
(47:52):
He didn't run to anyextreme to defend Joseph.
He just kind of said, I'm goingto let God handle that one.
So super cool.
Great example.
Casey Paul Griffiths (48:00):
Yeah.
Scott Woodward (48:00):
Well, Casey, that's a brief run through of
this skill of mental flexibility.
We think it's super crucial toa life of durable discipleship.
Anything else you want to say about thisas we kind of wrap all this up today?
Casey Paul Griffiths (48:15):
Just repeating the same points, that when you come
across something that maybe changesyour paradigm or shifts you a little
bit, it doesn't mean it has todestroy everything that you believe.
You change your assumptions, you move,and you're a little bit mentally nimble.
Like, we always talk abouta person staying consistent,
and that's important, right?
Scott Woodward (48:35):
Some ways.
Casey Paul Griffiths (48:36):
In some ways.
But It's also important to be flexible,too, in order to adjust things when
new evidence comes around so that yousee things and it doesn't break your
worldview of what's going on around.
So, yeah, I hope this has been helpful,and hopefully you've seen some good
examples from church history where peopleget confronted with new facts and they
(48:56):
respond in good ways and positive ways.
We're not making any summary judgmentsabout the people that we know here.
No final judgments.
We're just basically saying,hey, here's an example of
someone who is mentally flexible.
Here's an example of someone who wasn't.
And here's why this will bless and benefityou in your life and in your faith.
Scott Woodward (49:15):
Awesome.
Well, thanks for joining us, everybody.
Stay tuned next time.
We'll tackle our next skill.
Thank you for listening to thisepisode of Church History Matters.
Join us next time as we introducethe next skill we believe to be
vital to seeking truth and preservingfaith: the skill of putting facts,
(49:36):
especially shocking or uncomfortablefacts, into their historical,
theological, or cultural contexts.
This skill of contextualizing factsis essential in helping us know what
assumptions to bring to those factsso we know what meaning to give them.
If you're enjoying Church HistoryMatters, we'd appreciate it if you
could take a moment to subscribe, rate,review, and comment on the podcast.
(50:01):
That makes us easier to find.
Today's episode was produced byScott Woodward and edited by Nick
Galieti and Scott Woodward, with shownotes and transcript by Gabe Davis.
Church History Matters is a podcastof Scripture Central, a nonprofit
which exists to help build enduringfaith in Jesus Christ by making
Latter-day Saint scripture and churchhistory accessible, comprehensible,
(50:22):
and defensible to people everywhere.
For more resources to enhance yourgospel study, go to scripturecentral.org,
where everything is availablefor free because of the generous
donations of people like you.
And while we try very hard to behistorically and doctrinally accurate
in what we say on this podcast, pleaseremember that all views expressed in
this and every episode are our viewsalone and do not necessarily reflect the
(50:46):
views of Scripture Central or The Churchof Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.
Thank you so much for beinga part of this with us.
A fundamental moment in all good learning is that moment
where we modify our assumptions aboutthe world as a result of acquiring
new and more accurate knowledge.
This, in turn, primes usto make better decisions.
On one level, it's whatlearning is all about.
Sounds pretty basic, right?
Well, it is.
(00:26):
But it isn't always easy.
Church history can teach us thatmodifying one's assumptions can be a
challenge for some when it requiresthem to rethink their ideas about
God, prophets, and the church.
In today's episode of Church HistoryMatters, we're going to carefully look
at this skill of humbly revising ourassumptions in light of better or more
(00:46):
accurate information, a skill we'recalling mental flexibility, and then
take a look at key moments in thelives of a few people in our church's
history that show us why this skill isso crucial for durable discipleship.
I'm Scott Woodward, and my co-host isCasey Griffiths, and today we dive into
our sixth episode of this series dealingwith truth seeking and good thinking.
(01:10):
Now, let's get into it.
Casey Paul Griffiths (01:22):
Hi, Scott.
How you doing?
Scott Woodward (01:24):
Good.
How you doing, Casey?
Casey Paul Griffiths (01:25):
Good.
I'm excited to get to our topic today.
We're continuing—what didwe decide to call this?
We haven't settled on a name yet, have we?
Scott Woodward (01:34):
Listen, yeah, our listeners will just laugh at us because
this is episode six in this series.
So it has already gone out there.
It's been named, but please know,everybody, that at this point we
still don't know what to call it.
Casey Paul Griffiths (01:46):
I've been consistent in my advocacy for Toolbox of Truth.
Scott Woodward (01:51):
Epistemological tool belt.
I don't know.
Casey Paul Griffiths (01:56):
It's been really enjoyable so far to get
a chance to talk about this.
Scott Woodward (02:00):
Yeah.
Casey Paul Griffiths (02:00):
This is usually what we do kind of near the beginning
of our church history coursesbefore we dive into the history.
Scott Woodward (02:07):
Yeah.
Casey Paul Griffiths (02:07):
This is sort of setting the table, basically, to
understand how we talk about history,how we know if it's good history
or bad history, and how you canuse history as a tool to strengthen
your testimony if you have the rightkind of mindset as you approach it.
Scott Woodward (02:23):
Our burning question of the series has been, what mental
moves are made by intelligent,critically thinking Latter-day Saints
whose faith is strengthened ratherthan damaged by diving deeply into our
church's history and doctrine, right?
Or, in other words, what frameworksof thinking do they use when
approaching scripture and history?
Some people seem to have their faithrocked, and other people, their
(02:46):
faith is affirmed and strengthened.
What's the difference?
What's going on inside, mentally?
And so that's whatwe've been trying to do.
And so far, I think it's beenfun, hopefully productive,
and helpful for our listeners.
Casey Paul Griffiths (02:59):
And I think if we have a theme scripture that we base
this around, Doctrine and Covenants88 verses 118, which we've read
before—I'll read again (03:07):
“And as all have not faith, seek ye diligently.
Teach one another words of wisdom.
Seek ye out of the bestbooks words of wisdom.
Seek learning, even by study andalso by faith.” Seek learning.
The Lord wants us to be inquisitive andcurious and search out the truth and
do a deep dive into things like churchhistory, but also do so in a wise way.
Scott Woodward (03:31):
And it's awesome that that verse highlights that the Lord's solution
to not having faith is to seek learning.
Like, dig deeper with other seekers, outof the best books, by study and faith.
Like, what an awesome solution, right?
We don't need to be afraid of knowledge.
We need to go deeper into itas part of the Lord's remedy
for those who have not faith.
Casey Paul Griffiths (03:52):
Absolutely.
And just to use modern prophetsto affirm what the scriptures
have already taught, we've alsomentioned this quote from Dieter F.
Uchtdorf.
He said, “Latter-day Saints are not askedto blindly accept everything they hear.
We are encouraged to think anddiscover truth for ourselves.
We're expected to ponder, to search,to evaluate, and thereby to come to
a personal knowledge of the truth.
(04:14):
I went to the Education Weekdevotional this year where Elder
Renlund said we learn throughreason, observation, and faith,
that all these skills come together.
Scott Woodward (04:23):
Such a good talk.
We should put that in the show notes.
That talk was amazing.
Casey Paul Griffiths (04:27):
That was a great talk and highlights what
is great about Latter-day Saintepistemology, which is this idea that
truth is truth where'er 'tis found,on heathen or on Christian ground.
Scott Woodward (04:38):
Did you just write that?
Casey Paul Griffiths (04:40):
No!
That was—I wrote a book about a guy namedJoseph Merrill, and that was his theme.
He would quote that all the time.
He was a physicist and an apostle.
Scott Woodward (04:48):
I thought you were just busting into, like,
limerick or something there.
That was—
Casey Paul Griffiths (04:52):
Oh, yeah.
Yeah.
I've got all this—I'm a regular Thomas S.
Monson.
I've got all these poems memorized thatI can just break out whenever I need to.
Let's review really quickwhat we've already done—
Scott Woodward (05:03):
Okay.
Casey Paul Griffiths (05:03):
—so that we can get to what we're doing today.
So first we just introduced thisidea of, hey, it's good to be a
seeker, good to find these things.
Our second episode, I thinkwe talked a little bit about
evaluating what is church teaching.
We used three lenses.
The lenses are scripture and prophetsand the guidance of the Holy Spirit used
(05:25):
together as checks and balances on eachother to find out what the truth is and
how reliable a source is in saying, hey,this is actually what the church teaches.
This is church doctrine.
Scott Woodward (05:36):
Yeah.
Casey Paul Griffiths (05:37):
And then we did a practice.
Scott Woodward (05:39):
We played a little doctrinal pickleball in episode three.
Casey Paul Griffiths (05:41):
Yeah.
And I don't know who won,but we got a good workout,
and that was the whole point.
Scott Woodward (05:45):
That was fun.
Yeah.
That was the point.
It was all about the exercise.
Casey Paul Griffiths (05:48):
Absolutely.
And then in our fourth episode, wetalked about history, historicity,
how do you tell good history frombad history, and ran through a couple
examples of that using five questionshistorians use to discern reliable
historical claims from less reliable.
And then we practiced a couple of claimslinked to Book of Mormon witnesses.
Scott Woodward (06:09):
Yeah.
That was our last episode.
That was fun.
Good time.
Casey Paul Griffiths (06:11):
That was fun.
So, tell us what we're doing today, Scott.
What's the plan?
Scott Woodward (06:15):
Okay.
So today we're introducing a newskill or mindset that we're calling
mental flexibility, all right?
So mental flexibility, I believe,is crucial to maintaining and
building true faith, like rock-ribbedfaith, the kind that endures.
Durable discipleship must have inthe tool kit mental flexibility.
(06:39):
It pushes against fixed thinking, whichcan be quite detrimental in many areas of
life, but particularly to a life of faith.
So let me define the term here.
So mental flexibility is the ability toidentify, challenge, and modify one's own
assumptions in light of new informationafter humble and honest analysis.
(07:01):
Do we have the ability to identifyour assumptions, challenge those
assumptions, and modify thoseassumptions in light of new information?
And if we can do that, we are well on ourway to the path of durable discipleship.
If we cannot do that, then ourbeliefs become brittle, and they
can break under pressure, is howI would summarize it briefly.
Casey Paul Griffiths (07:21):
A book that you and I both read in the last couple weeks, and
I don't think we planned this, did we?
We just—
Scott Woodward (07:26):
No, we didn't talk about it.
Casey Paul Griffiths (07:28):
It's not a book by an apostle.
Scott Woodward (07:30):
No.
Casey Paul Griffiths (07:30):
But it's a great book that we're going
to give a little shout out to.
It's by a guy named Adam Grant.
Scott Woodward (07:34):
Yes.
Casey Paul Griffiths (07:35):
The name of the book is Think Again, where it's
basically about being mentally flexible.
Scott Woodward (07:40):
Yeah.
I'd call it one of the best books.
You know, when you drill down toa particular topic, the best book
on that topic may not be by aLatter-day Saint, and that's okay.
As Joseph Smith says, we'll taketruth from wherever it comes, right?
Truth is truth, where'er 'tis found.
Go ahead, Casey.
What's the
. . .? Casey Paul Griffiths: “On heathen or on Christian ground.” And we're
not saying Adam Grant is a heathen.
(08:01):
No, he's awesome.
Casey Paul Griffiths (08:02):
But—
Scott Woodward (08:03):
I love Adam Grant.
Casey Paul Griffiths (08:04):
We admire the flexibility that he's shown.
Scott Woodward (08:06):
Yeah, when it comes to the topic of rethinking your
assumptions or to dig into thisskill set of mental flexibility.
I can't think of a better bookthan Think Again by Adam Grant.
So there you go.
Casey Paul Griffiths (08:18):
Amen.
And so a couple quotes from the book.
He says, “Intelligence is traditionallyviewed as the ability to think and learn.
Yet in a turbulent world, there's anotherset of cognitive skills that might matter
more (08:30):
the ability to rethink and unlearn.”
Scott Woodward (08:35):
Ah, shoot.
Now that's a great quotespiritually as well.
Like, if you want to maintain yourtestimony in a turbulent world, it
is crucial to have this skill set.
Can you rethink, and can you unlearn?
What else?
Any other good quotes?
Casey Paul Griffiths (08:48):
Ah, I like this one.
He says, “When it comes toour knowledge and opinions,
we tend to stick to our guns.
Psychologists call thisseizing and freezing.
We favor the comfort of conviction overthe discomfort of doubt, and we let our
beliefs get brittle long before our bones.
We listen to views that make us feelgood instead of ideas that make us
(09:10):
think hard.” I'm guessing, you know,sometimes a person that wants to tear
down faith is also trying to sortof convince you that, you know what?
You come across something thatyou haven't heard before, that
means everything is wrong.
What Adam Grant is suggesting is you comeacross something that you haven't heard
before, that doesn't necessarily meanwhat you believe is wrong, but you might
(09:32):
need to re-examine your assumptions aboutthose things and wonder if your thinking
has been right along the way and if youneed to change your thinking a little bit.
Scott Woodward (09:41):
Yeah.
You know, Elder Uchtdorf, in anothertalk he gave, it's a little phrase
that's made some headway in thechurch, which is, “Doubt your doubts
before you doubt your faith.” Wecould even use the word assumptions.
Doubt your assumptionsbefore you doubt your faith.
Like, you might have some blind spots.
And that's okay.
That's what this skill is all about, isrethinking your blind spots: Rethinking
what you thought you knew, but in lightof new information, being able to adjust.
(10:05):
Being nimble and having somedexterity there with your thinking.
Okay, here's another quote fromAdam Grant that goes along that.
He said, “We all have blind spotsin our knowledge and opinion.
The bad news is that they can leaveus blind to our blindness, which gives
us false confidence in our judgmentand prevents us from rethinking.
The good news is that with theright kind of confidence we
(10:25):
can learn to see ourselves moreclearly and update our views.
In driver's training we weretaught to identify our visual
blind spots and eliminate them withthe help of mirrors and sensors.
In life, since our minds don'tcome equipped with those tools,
we need to learn to recognize ourcognitive blind spots and revise
our thinking accordingly.” So good.
So good.
Casey Paul Griffiths (10:44):
Mm-hmm.
Scott Woodward (10:45):
That's what we need to do.
That's what we want to talk about today.
How do you do that, especiallyin a context of learning church
history, studying this topic,which frankly some people are a
little bit nervous about, right?
Some people are afraid what they mightlearn in church history and what might
challenge their thinking, maybe evencause doubts in their testimony, right?
I guess we're here to say today that ifyou can develop this skill, that's going
(11:07):
to be a much less likely outcome, right?
That you're going to somehow be blindsidedby some fact in church history that's
going to cause your testimony to crumble.
That doesn't happen when you comeat it with the right mindset,
the right skill set, I would say.
Casey Paul Griffiths (11:21):
Yeah.
This is an interesting word thatAdam Grant uses is humility.
Scott Woodward (11:27):
Yeah.
I like that word.
Casey Paul Griffiths: Here's another quote. (11:28):
undefined
He says, “As we gain experience,we lose some of our humility and
have a false sense of mastery.
We get trapped in a beginner's bubble offlawed assumptions, and we're ignorant
of our own ignorance.” Then he introducesthis phrase: he says, “Confident
humility,” which sounds like an oxymoron,right, “gives us enough doubt to reexamine
(11:49):
our old knowledge and enough confidenceto pursue new insights.” And so we're
saying have the humility to say, I couldhave been wrong in the way I saw this,
but be confident to say, I think if Ire-examine this, it's going to help me.
It's going to make me a better person.
We're all seeking the truth here.
And every once in a while agood reevaluation of how we see
(12:12):
things can be really helpful.
It makes us be more flexible.
Scott Woodward (12:16):
Yeah.
Okay.
Should we practice?
Should we dive in and should we try touse this skill with some church history
and kind of show how it can play out?
Maybe use examples of people in churchhistory who either did a good job or
(12:40):
a bad job at being mentally flexible?
Casey Paul Griffiths (12:43):
Yeah, so here's some case scenarios.
We're going to start with aguy named Joseph Wakefield.
Scott Woodward (12:48):
Okay.
Who's Joseph Wakefield?
Casey Paul Griffiths (12:50):
Joseph Wakefield is an elder in the early church.
He's briefly mentioned in Doctrineand Covenants 52 verse 35, and he
was called to accompany a wholegroup of missionaries that were going
to travel from Ohio to Missouri.
Now, one of the people heconverts is actually George A.
Smith.
This is grandfather of theprophet George Albert Smith.
Scott Woodward (13:12):
He's the namesake of St.
George, isn't he?
St.
George, Utah is—this is George A.
Smith.
Casey Paul Griffiths (13:16):
He is, yeah.
He's all over southern Utah, andhe becomes the church historian.
And George A.
Smith was a brilliant historian becausehe was great at picking out these little
nuggets that kind of taught principles.
Again, this is the guy thatconverted him, but I'll spoil
the end of the story for you.
Joseph Wakefield leaves the church.
But here's what George A.
(13:37):
Smith says is the reason why he left.
Okay, this is in the Journal ofDiscourses, volume 7, page 112.
He said, “Joseph H.
Wakefield, who baptized me, after havingapostatized from the church announced
to the astonished world the fact that,while he was a guest in the house of
Joseph Smith, he had absolutely seen theprophet come down from the room where he
(13:58):
was engaged in translating the word ofGod,” this is the Bible translation, “and
actually go to playing with the children.
This convinced him the prophet was nota man of God and that the work was false
which to me, and hundreds of others, hehad testified that he knew came from God.
He afterwards headed a mob meetingand took the lead in bringing about
a persecution against the saints inKirtland and the regions round about.”
Scott Woodward (14:21):
Wow.
Casey Paul Griffiths (14:22):
So Joseph Wakefield apostatized because he saw
Joseph Smith playing with some children.
Scott Woodward (14:28):
Okay.
So, alright.
So he left the church because he sawthe prophet playing with children.
And he's going to lead mobs againstthe church as a result of his apostasy.
Casey Paul Griffiths (14:39):
Yeah.
Scott Woodward (14:40):
Okay, so let's walk through.
What are the mental moves you wouldmake if you're applying this skill
set or mindset of mental flexibility?
So mental move number one here isfirst, real simply, just identify
the assumptions, all right?
Casey Paul Griffiths (14:55):
Mm-hmm.
Scott Woodward (14:55):
All right, Casey, what are Joseph Wakefield's
assumptions about prophets here?
Casey Paul Griffiths (15:02):
I mean, it seems like the guy thinks that
prophets can't play with children.
Scott Woodward (15:06):
Yeah.
Casey Paul Griffiths (15:06):
That prophets are always serious and sober and
. . . Scott Woodward: Solemn.
Solemn.
Because this onemystifies me a little bit.
Like, what, what's the big deal?
You know?
Scott Woodward (15:18):
What's the big deal?
Casey Paul Griffiths (15:19):
But I guess, yeah, that's his assumption
to be a solemn, distant figure and doesn'tdo stuff like wrestle with kids or, you
know, play games or something like that.
Scott Woodward (15:29):
Yeah.
God's work will not be led bymen who play with children.
And since Joseph plays with children,he must not be a prophet of God, and
therefore this isn't the work of God.
Or something like that, right?
Okay, okay, so that'smental move number one.
You've got to—let's be reallyclear about assumptions.
So mental move number two now is nowchallenge the assumption, usually
(15:50):
against one of the best books.
I always start with scripture.
Let's challenge the assumption.
The way that Adam Grant asksit, he says, “How do you know?
It's a question we need to ask moreoften, both of ourselves and of others.
The power lies in its frankness.
It's non-judgmental, astraightforward expression of doubt
and curiosity that doesn't putpeople on the defensive, right?
(16:11):
So ask yourself, ask others,like, how do you know?
Let's challenge the assumption.
Are these assumptions true,Joseph Wakefield, or not?
And I don't know, as I think about it,as I look at the best books, Casey,
I can't find anything in scripture oranywhere else that would disqualify
a man from being a true prophet ofGod because he plays with children,
especially his own children, right?
Casey Paul Griffiths (16:29):
Yeah, this is weird because, I mean, I can't find any place
where it says the Savior played games withchildren, but the Savior loved children
and blessed children and didn't seem tohave any problem being in their presence.
Scott Woodward (16:42):
“Suffer the children to come unto me, for of
such is the kingdom of God.” Yeah.
Casey Paul Griffiths (16:47):
Yeah.
It feels like JosephWakefield's assumptions may
have been opposed to scripture.
At the very least, scripture doesn'tsay that they can't play with children.
The prophets can't let loose and do alittle stickpull or something like that.
Scott Woodward (17:01):
Right?
Yeah, certainly not.
Okay, so that then leads to mentalmove number three, which is modify your
assumption in light of the new informationafter a humble and honest analysis, right?
You go to the scriptures, startwith the best books—scripture.
Is there anything there thatwould prevent a prophet of God
from wrestling with children?
You know what?
Upon humble analysis, no, there's not.
(17:21):
So Joseph Wakefield would havebeen helped by looking maybe at the
humanity of prophets in scripture.
Again, there's nothing that disqualifiesa prophet from doing normal, human
things like Joseph was doing.
The sad news in this case is Wakefielddid not modify his assumption,
and so he apostatized and thenturns to fight against the work.
So here's the thing (17:40):
When your assumptions about God, prophets, or
the church are violated by reality,now your faith is in jeopardy.
In this case, the reality wasJoseph plays with his children.
At that moment, Joseph Wakefield'sfaith was in jeopardy because
his assumption was violated.
So now this puts you at a crossroads,and you now have essentially two
choices (18:00):
Number one, throw out everything you believe about God,
prophets, and the church, or, numbertwo, recognize that you could be wrong.
You might have a blind spot.
And now, be a seeker, and go back tosources of truth, go back to the best
books, and reexamine your expectationsagainst the truth of the Word of God, and
then modify your assumptions accordingly.
(18:23):
And now you're in a place where whena prophet plays with his children,
that does nothing to your faith.
In fact, that actually iskind of endearing, right?
The way that Jesus in 3 Nephi 17 and otherplaces, when he's tender with children,
rather than being faith damaging, itkind of becomes faith strengthening.
Casey Paul Griffiths (18:38):
Agreed.
This is maybe the extreme exampleof mental inflexibility, right?
Who was this guy, and what's his deal?
Let's try maybe a harder one.
Scott Woodward (18:50):
Okay.
Casey Paul Griffiths: So example number two. (19:03):
undefined
Scott, tell us about Ezra Booth.
Scott Woodward (19:06):
Okay, Ezra Booth.
This man joined the church in May of1831 when he saw, with his own eyes,
the prophet Joseph Smith heal the lamearm of a woman named Elsa Johnson.
This is John Johnson's wife.
They'll have a couple kids who becomeapostles, Luke and Lyman Johnson.
Like, great family up in Hiram, Ohio.
So after his conversion, Booth, alongwith other missionaries, were called and
(19:30):
sent to Missouri in the summer of 1831.
Now, Booth becomes upset abouthaving to walk and preach the entire
journey from Ohio to Missouri.
And he began to criticize and findfault with the leadership of the
church, especially Joseph Smith.
And then when he actually arrivesin Missouri, he's disappointed
at not experiencing miraculousmanifestations of the spirit of Zion.
(19:52):
Instead he only saw churchleaders unimpressively lay a
small stone and a shrub oak as thecornerstone and foundation of Zion.
Ezra was not impressed.
This little cornerstone ceremony wasdone in a little dedicatory service
of the land in a spot for the temple.
And then the church leadersannounced that it was time to turn
(20:13):
around and return back to Ohio.
So shortly after his return toOhio, Elder Booth came out as an
apostate, Joseph Smith recorded.
I'll continue to quote Joseph Smithhere: he said, “He came into the
church upon seeing a person healed ofan infirmity of many years standing.
He went up to Missouri as a missionary,but when he actually learned that faith,
humility, patience, and tribulation gobefore blessing, and that God brings
(20:37):
low before He exalts, that instead ofthe Savior’s granting him power to smite
men and make them believe, as he said hewanted God to do in his own case, then
he was disappointed and turned away andbecame an apostate.” So there you go.
That's Ezra's sad story.
And he'll actually continueto fight against the church.
He'll write several news articleswhich tear down confidence in Joseph
(20:59):
Smith, Sidney Rigdon, and others.
Sidney Rigdon will actually challenge himto a public debate, to which Ezra does not
show up, but he continues to be a littlebit of a thorn in the side of church
leaders there for a short amount of timeafter his apostasy through publishing.
In fact, I think he publishes the firstanti-Mormon material, doesn't he, Casey?
Casey Paul Griffiths (21:18):
He publishes some of the first anti-Mormon material, and
here's a unique thing about Ezra Booth.
There's actually a section of theDoctrine and Covenants dedicated
to Ezra Booth telling thembasically to go out and rebuke him.
Scott Woodward (21:31):
Yeah, yeah.
Casey Paul Griffiths (21:32):
And so that’s got to be a little special, you know, to be the
first person who the Lord publicly says,you've got to go out and rebuke this guy.
This is section 71—
Scott Woodward (21:43):
Yeah.
Casey Paul Griffiths (21:43):
—of the Doctrine and Covenants, where the
Lord says, “Confound your enemies.”He's talking about Ezra Booth.
“Call upon them to meet you,both in public and in private.
Inasmuch as you're faithful, theirshame shall be made manifest.
Wherefore, let them bring theirstrong reasons against the Lord.
Verily, thus saith the Lord untoyou, there is no weapon formed
against you that shall prosper.”
Scott Woodward (22:02):
That's what led Sidney to calling him out, right?
He actually gives a public notice,like, I hereby call Ezra Booth and
Symonds Rider was the other guy—
Casey Paul Griffiths (22:08):
Yeah.
Scott Woodward (22:09):
—to come and answer their claims against Joseph and the Book of
Mormon and the church, especially the Bookof Mormon, and Sidney wants to go toe to
toe and debate that, but it's because theLord backed him up and said, yeah, let
them bring forth their strong reasons.
Let's do this.
Casey Paul Griffiths (22:21):
Yep.
Bring it on So let's talk about—boy,there's a lot to unpack here, and Ezra
Booth is a fascinating figure, but—
Scott Woodward (22:29):
Yeah.
Casey Paul Griffiths (22:29):
—a couple things
Scott Woodward (22:32):
Yeah.
Casey Paul Griffiths (22:33):
—which the Lord warns against several times
in the Doctrine and Covenants,you know, he that seeketh a sign.
But it seems like one of Ezra'sassumptions was that there would be
stuff like Elsa Johnson's healinghappening all the time in the church.
And actually, there was a lot ofstuff that happened in the early
church, but to assume that it wasgoing to be stuff like that every
(22:53):
day might be a wrong assumption.
Scott Woodward (22:56):
Yeah.
He seemed to believe that prophetswere supposed to be, like,
constantly impressive, right?
That when he gets to Zion and seesJoseph Smith and Sidney Rigdon laying
a very unimpressive cornerstonein Zion and having a shrub oak as
part of the ceremony, he's like,okay, this is not impressive.
So his assumption’s violatedthere, it looks like.
Casey Paul Griffiths (23:18):
Yeah.
And he must have assumed that Zionwas going to, you know, magically
appear without any—one of the thingsEzra Booth writes about is that Joseph
Smith and Edward Partridge got into anargument over the right plot of land.
He must have assumed that therewouldn't be any intense discussions
about the location of Zion.
Scott Woodward (23:38):
Edward Partridge thought the land wasn't very impressive, right?
If I remember the argument, Joseph says.
No, this is the spot.
You need a little more faith, brother.
Ezra didn't like that.
Casey Paul Griffiths (23:49):
It also seems like he just complained a lot.
He thought the missionarywork would be easier.
And to his credit, he travels allthe way from Ohio to Missouri.
That's a long journey and a toughjourney, but it seems like Ezra
just wasn't really—this wasn'twhat he signed up for, right?
He's feeling like it would be easy toteach people, it wouldn't require a
(24:10):
lot of work, and that's kind of whatcauses him to become disillusioned.
Scott Woodward (24:14):
You should be able to smite men and make them believe.
That's what Joseph saidthat Ezra said, right?
He wanted to be able to do amiracle and make people believe.
Kind of makes sense, consideringhow he came into the church, but
he wanted to be, again, impressive.
He wanted to be really impressive andmiraculous as a missionary, but most
missionary work, as most of us knowwho serve missions, is not glorious.
(24:36):
It's kind of tedious, with theoccasional breakthrough, and other
than that, it's a lot of sweat and alot of hard work and a lot of normal,
mundane, difficult days, right?
That's the reality.
Casey Paul Griffiths (24:49):
It's a lot less glorious than we
sometimes assume it will be.
Scott Woodward (24:53):
Than Ezra thought it would be.
Yeah.
Sometimes we have that same assumption.
Casey Paul Griffiths (24:57):
Right.
Scott Woodward (24:57):
So you just did mental move number one.
We identified his assumptions, right?
So, okay, so mental move numbertwo with this skill set is, okay,
now challenge the assumption,usually against scripture here.
What do you think, Casey?
Are those assumptions true inany degree, and why or why not?
Casey Paul Griffiths (25:11):
Well, I mean, we just already talked about one.
It's not easy, right?
Scott Woodward (25:16):
Yeah.
Casey Paul Griffiths (25:16):
And secondly, there's a kind of down to earth,
when it comes to building Zion,mental leap that we have to make.
Building Zion happens in a thousandlittle ways every single day.
It can be something as mundane asrolling a rock up against a scrub oak.
You have to start somewhere, right?
But it seems like the big issueEzra was having was he just
(25:38):
expected stuff like Elsa Johnson'shealing to happen every day.
The scriptures seem to identify miraclesas being the exception and not the rule.
Several sections in the Doctrine andCovenants, the Savior warns against
seeking signs, that signs come afterwe've demonstrated faith, and not before.
(25:58):
And it seems in Ezra's case that hemixed up the process, that his faith
came from seeing something miraculous,and it's not supposed to work that way.
You're supposed to demonstratefaith, and then the miracles come.
So I would say a lot of hisassumptions don't really line up
with the scriptures or the waythings work as we understand them.
Scott Woodward (26:17):
So then mental move number three, modify the assumption
in light of new informationafter humble and honest analysis.
Yeah, for Ezra Booth to have goneto the scriptures and looking
at, okay, what do we learn aboutmissionary work from scripture, right?
Let's just take Paul as an examplein scripture as a missionary.
Like, what do we learn?
What assumptions could we build outabout missionary work from looking
(26:40):
at Paul's own efforts, right?
One of the greatestmissionaries in scripture.
I'm reminded of what Paul himself saysabout his own missionary efforts in 2nd
Corinthians 11, for instance, where hesaid, “Of the Jews five times received
I forty stripes save one.” Five times Iwas beaten thirty-nine times on my back.
“Thrice was I beaten with rods.
Once was I stoned.
(27:01):
Thrice I suffered shipwreck.
A night and a day have I been in the deep,in the ocean, in journeyings often, in
perils of waters, in perils of robbers,in perils of my own countrymen, in
perils by the heathen, in perils in thecity, in perils in the wilderness, in
perils in the sea, in perils among falsebrethren, in weariness and painfulness
and watchings often and hunger and thirst,fasting often and cold and nakedness.”
(27:25):
I'm getting the vibe from Paul thatsometimes missionary work is hard.
Casey Paul Griffiths (27:29):
Yeah.
Scott Woodward (27:30):
And sometimes it's—people don't like you, and
sometimes it's going to be unglorious.
Casey Paul Griffiths (27:36):
Yeah.
Scott Woodward (27:36):
So if Ezra Booth could have reexamined his assumptions
in light of scripture, could havegone to the Book of Mormon, looked
at the sons of Mosiah, missionarywork there, not always glorious.
Some moments, yes.
Some moments.
But not generally.
It's not just filled withmiracle after miracle, right?
It's not an unbroken chain of miracles.
Casey Paul Griffiths (27:52):
Mm-hmm.
Scott Woodward (27:53):
It's often hard with moments of breakthrough.
Casey Paul Griffiths (27:57):
The other thing I would add there, too, is from the
life of Paul, we'd also learn thatprophets get into arguments, you know?
Paul and Barnabas have a bigol’ argument over whether or
not Mark should come with them.
And it's apparently so severethat they part ways, that these
two mission companions justcan't even with each other.
Scott Woodward (28:16):
Or Galatians 2, where Paul calls out Peter for fraternizing too much
with the Jews instead of the Gentiles.
Casey Paul Griffiths (28:23):
The Judaizers.
Scott Woodward (28:24):
Yeah, yeah.
Casey Paul Griffiths (28:25):
So, I mean, it seems like Ezra had sort of, I'm
not going to say deified, but maybeglorified the idea of a prophet too much.
And when he saw the prophet actingas a human, you know, getting into
arguments with his friends or travelingunder unpleasant circumstances,
it just didn't work for him.
Scott Woodward (28:42):
Yeah.
Casey Paul Griffiths (28:43):
And so he's confronted with two choices.
Throw out everything you believeabout God, prophets, and the
church, or recognize you could bewrong and update your assumptions.
Prophets are human.
Scott Woodward (28:52):
Yeah.
Casey Paul Griffiths: Building Zion is a process. (28:52):
undefined
Missionary work is hard.
You adjust all those things, and you'regoing to be okay, but it seems like he
just really couldn't make the adjustment.
Scott Woodward (29:03):
Of the two choices that you're basically confronted with
when your assumptions are violated,he chose to throw out everything he
believed about God, prophets, andthe church rather than, as you said,
recognizing that he could be wrong.
Rather than being a seeker.
Rather than going back to sources oftruth, the best books, to reexamine
his expectations against the truthof the word of God and modifying
(29:23):
his assumptions accordingly.
So Ezra Booth is a sad tale of whathappens when you don't employ the skill
set of mental flexibility and you'recaught in the trap of fixed thinking.
He's a victim of fixed thinking.
Casey Paul Griffiths (29:49):
All right.
For example number three, thisis a hypothetical example.
This is not a real person.
Scott Woodward (29:54):
Okay.
Casey Paul Griffiths (29:55):
Modern example.
Okay.
So this person, we'regoing to call him Ryan.
Scott Woodward (29:59):
Okay.
Casey Paul Griffiths (29:59):
This isn't based on any person we know, okay?
I know you have a brother named Ryan.
This isn't him.
Scott Woodward (30:04):
I have a brother named Ryan.
Yeah.
Ryan, this is not about you.
Okay.
Casey Paul Griffiths (30:07):
Yeah.
Ryan stumbled across a website criticalof the church, which pointed out that
when modern Egyptologists examinefacsimiles one, two, and three in our
Book of Abraham, they interpret themvery differently than Joseph Smith did.
The facsimiles, they say, really havenothing to do with Abraham, but are an
ancient embalming scene, facsimile 1;a buried hypocephalus, facsimile 2; and
(30:29):
a judgment scene from the 125th chapterof the Book of the Dead, facsimile 3.
The website points out that this is solidevidence that Joseph Smith was wrong about
the facsimiles and is therefore a fraud.
Ryan is floored by this informationand unable to reconcile how
Joseph could be wrong about thisand still be a true prophet.
He feels his testimony is disintegrating.
Scott Woodward (30:51):
Okay, so you said this is a hypothetical example.
Casey Paul Griffiths (30:54):
Yeah.
Scott Woodward (30:54):
But honestly this, like, totally happens, like,
all the time to people, right?
Casey Paul Griffiths (30:58):
Mm-hmm.
Scott Woodward (30:58):
Coming across information online, your assumptions are
violated, now what are you going to do?
What are you going to do?
Right.
Should we break it down?
Casey Paul Griffiths (31:06):
Let's break it down.
Scott Woodward (31:08):
Mental move number one.
Let's identify the assumptions.
I feel like there's a lot in here.
I feel like Ryan has someassumptions about Joseph Smith in
here, Joseph's translation process.
What else?
Modern Egyptologists’ conclusions—howabout the conclusions of the
website he's reading from?
So maybe let's break down all of those.
So let's start with Joseph Smith.
What are his assumptionsabout Joseph Smith?
(31:30):
Ryan seems to think that JosephSmith's interpretations of the Book
of Abraham must agree with those ofmodern Egyptologists in order for his
translation to be considered valid.
Maybe that's one assumption.
His assumption aboutJoseph's translation process?
He seems to think that Joseph eithertranslated the papyri using the
same process modern Egyptologistsuse today, or at least he should
(31:51):
have arrived at the same conclusionsthat modern Egyptologists come to,
regardless of his translation process.
What else?
Ryan seems to think that modernEgyptologists’ literal interpretation
should be considered the final word onthe meaning of the papyri, maybe, and
should be the standard against whichJoseph Smith's translations are measured.
At one level seems veryreasonable, very rational.
(32:12):
I don't have a ton of problems withthat, but that can be dangerous.
We'll talk about why here in a second.
And then Ryan seems to think that thewebsite he's reading from is giving
him the unfiltered, untarnished truthand that there's no other way to
responsibly interpret the evidence.
Anything you'd add?
Casey Paul Griffiths (32:29):
No, that's a pretty good summary of the assumptions
a person might make in this situation.
If that's the case, then let'schallenge Ryan's assumptions here.
Scott Woodward (32:38):
Okay.
Casey Paul Griffiths (32:38):
Are they too rigid?
Are they too narrow?
Scott Woodward (32:41):
Yeah, we did a series about this, didn't we?
Casey Paul Griffiths (32:43):
Yeah, we did.
Scott Woodward (32:44):
This was in our Translations and Revelations series.
We went through, I think, two episodestalking about this very point that,
yeah, when you actually look in thebest books written by those who are
Egyptologists—we highlighted KerryMuhlestein, his little book, Let's
Talk About the Book of Abraham.
He does a great job talking about whateyewitnesses say the sources were that
(33:07):
Joseph was translating from, and it alwaysseems to be consistent that it was a long
roll which we no longer have, destroyedin the Chicago Fire of 1871, most likely.
And all we have left are elevenlittle fragments that were sent a
different way to the MetropolitanMuseum of Art in New York and came
to our knowledge in the 1960s.
(33:28):
And so according to eyewitnessaccounts Joseph isn't translating from
those fragments, as far as we know.
Casey Paul Griffiths (33:34):
Yeah.
Scott Woodward (33:35):
But what we did point out is, the thing that is
challenging, though, is it does seemlike Joseph translates a little.
Like on facsimile one, you have littlenumbers, facsimile two, there's little
numbers, facsimile three, there's littlenumbers, and when you look at those
numbers and there's a little explanation,at least, in English underneath
them, which seems to be an effort attranslation, and when modern Egyptologists
(33:55):
look at those facsimiles, they say,that's not what those are about, right?
So, let's go to mental movenumber three on this, then.
So how would you modify your assumptionin light of new information here
after a humble and honest analysis?
If you go to the best books on this,which might not, in this case, be
scripture (34:10):
It might be scholarship by someone like Kerry Muhlestein or John
Gee or Stephen Smoot or John Thompson.
Like, what information might behelpful here for Ryan to think
more clearly through this issueand then adjust his assumptions?
Casey Paul Griffiths (34:26):
So, first, I mean, we talked about all of this on
our Book of Abraham podcast, but oneassumption that we make is that the
drawings can only mean one thing.
Scott Woodward (34:36):
Right.
Casey Paul Griffiths (34:37):
Egyptian Jews, Jewish people living in
Egypt, sometimes repurposed Egyptiansymbology for their own purposes.
So the facsimiles in the book ofAbraham are an example of visual
iconography that can sometimesbe used for different reasons.
And when you think about that for aminute, we use different symbols to
represent different things all the time.
(34:58):
Is that the case, when Joseph Smithinterpreted the facsimiles, that he was
giving the way one group may have usedthe symbols and not worrying about another
group, how they might've used the symbols.
Scott Woodward (35:10):
And what's particularly convincing in this case is that the
area that these papyri were discoveredis a place called Thebes, Egypt, right?
About second century BC.
And what modern Egyptologists have foundis that some Jews living in that area
would repurpose Egyptian drawings likethe facsimiles to tell stories about the
(35:32):
Old Testament people such as Abraham.
We've actually found evidence ofthem using facsimiles that were not
originally intended to talk aboutAbraham, like lion couch scene, right,
of Facsimile 1, and using those toactually tell stories about Abraham.
There's actually a cool exampleof that that has been found.
And so, on that level, JosephSmith's interpretation is spot on.
(35:55):
It's a booyah.
So this borrowing from each other andgiving secondary meanings to Egyptian
hieroglyphics can easily account forthe disagreement between what modern
Egyptologists say the fragments mean,which is the original Egyptian meaning,
and then what Joseph Smith interpretedthem to mean, which is that secondary
meaning that was applied to hieroglyphsat that time where those scrolls
(36:15):
were found in the second century B.
C., right, to tell Abraham's story.
That's actually a really cool find thatwas discovered after Joseph Smith's death,
which is all the more cool, actually.
Casey Paul Griffiths (36:25):
Yeah.
Scott Woodward (36:26):
What else?
What else might help Ryan?
Casey Paul Griffiths (36:28):
Oh, Ryan might make some assumptions about
the website he's reading from, too.
If you're assuming that everythingyou read on the internet is accurate,
you could run into some bad roads.
And we talked about this when we talkedabout historicity, but consider the
motives behind the people that write it.
You know, if someone writes toodefinitively, if someone is basically
(36:50):
saying this is the way it is andthere's no other way to look at this
and interpret it, that's sometimes asign of bad thinking, I guess you'd say.
Scott Woodward (36:59):
Yeah.
Rigid thinking.
Casey Paul Griffiths: Rigid thinking, right? (37:00):
undefined
That it has to be this way, andtherefore you have to do this.
So that could be a problem as well.
It's just assuming that something you'veread on the internet without checking
it out a little bit is good information.
Scott Woodward (37:16):
And we talked about, too, the difference between
a fact and an inference on a fact.
Like, the facts of the case hereare, let's just review, that, yes,
modern Egyptologists interpret thefacsimiles different than Joseph Smith.
That is a fact.
But the website that Ryan ran into theninferred from that fact that Joseph Smith
(37:36):
was therefore a fraud and a false prophet.
That's an inference.
That's not the fact.
And what we're trying to do herewith looking deeper into some of the
best books is see if there's not moreinformation, better information that
can help us make sense of those facts.
We've just given an exampleof how that is the case.
The repurposing of facsimiles isactually super cool and very helpful.
(37:58):
That does not lead you to the necessaryconclusion that Joseph is a fraud here,
but actually leads you to a conclusionthat's, like, how on earth could Joseph
have known that facsimiles like that wererepurposed to tell Abraham's stories when
nobody knew that until after he died?
Like, suddenly that becomes somethingthat is faith strengthening rather
than faith destroying, right?
(38:18):
Just keep digging.
Keep seeking into the bestbooks, the best scholars.
Like, people have wrestled with this.
What have they found?
What have they learned, right?
So, Ryan would be very well served,like we all would, of recognizing
the difference between the factsof the matter and then inference
about those facts based on one'sassumptions and your hermeneutic, right?
(38:39):
The hermeneutic of suspicionhere is Egyptologists disagree
with Joseph, therefore, boom.
Joseph is false prophet.
Like, that's a hermeneutic ofsuspicion that's not challenging
their own assumptions.
Casey Paul Griffiths (38:48):
Yeah.
Scott Woodward (38:49):
The mindset of mental flexibility here is so crucial to
keep the options open and dig deeper,especially on this particular one, because
the answer is not obvious here, right?
The answer is not obvious.
You're not just going tobe like, oh, that's easy.
The answer's actually super cool once youget into it, but Ryan, hold on your way.
All the Ryans out there, when youcome across something like that
(39:09):
that just seems irreconcilable, justknow that that's an opportunity for
deeper seeking, deeper learning.
Keep your mind open andflexible, and resolution almost
always comes in those cases.
Casey Paul Griffiths (39:22):
In this situation, I would hope Ryan
also wouldn't panic, basically.
You know, sometimes when we'represented with new material that we
haven't heard of before, the impulseis to immediately act on it, to throw
everything out, when in reality, whenyou come across something, you can just
say, I haven't encountered that before.
Let me look into it a little bit, andusually, after a little bit of searching,
(39:44):
you'll find out that it wasn't—it'snew to you; it wasn't new to everybody.
And there are answersand way to reconcile it.
The facsimiles in the book of Abraham area great example, because it's always used
as a gotcha by people that want to destroyfaith, but when you start looking into it
deeper, and you start to understand thecultural context and everything that's
happening, like you mentioned, it actuallycan become something that deepens your
(40:07):
faith rather than harming your faith.
So I would say, you know, don't panic.
Realize you're at a crossroads,and it might change the way that
you think about prophets and howprophets carry out their work, but
it doesn't mean you have to throwout everything that's been meaningful
and powerful and beautiful to you.
Scott Woodward (40:25):
Ryan, here you are.
You're at the crossroads, right?
When your assumptions arebeing violated by reality here,
your faith is in jeopardy.
What are you going to do, brother?
You got two choices.
Throw out everything you believeabout God, prophets, and the church,
or recognize you could be wrong.
The website could bewrong that you're reading.
Be a seeker.
Go to sources of truth, the best books,whatever is the best source to get real,
(40:49):
solid answers to this particular issue,then re-examine your expectations against
the truth that you're finding, and thenmodify your assumptions accordingly.
And like you said, you mightcome out of that experience
thinking of prophets differently.
That's okay, as long as thatmatches reality better, right?
I don't think of prophets the same asI thought about them when I was 10,
or when I was 20, or when I was 30.
(41:09):
Like, I continue to modify myassumptions about prophets, but I
can boldly stand up and testify thatthey actually are prophets of God.
Totally believe Josephis a prophet of God.
That means something different to me nowthan it did when I was 17, but it's sweet,
and it's rich, and to me it's beautiful.
Casey Paul Griffiths: And that's a good thing. (41:25):
undefined
That shows that you're mentallyflexible enough that you can grow.
You haven't locked yourself into one wayof thinking, so when new information comes
along, it's not going to totally breakyour framework that you exist within.
Scott Woodward (41:38):
I hope so.
Casey Paul Griffiths (41:51):
Well, we used two negative examples and then one
hypothetical, I hope this turnsout okay for Ryan, kind of example.
Scott Woodward (41:57):
Yeah.
Good luck, Ryan.
Casey Paul Griffiths (41:58):
Is there a good example of flexible thinking
that we could model here, too?
Like, someone from church historywho came across a difficult problem
and did okay, and who is that?
Scott Woodward (42:09):
Yes.
Let me set the scene here.
In Kirtland, Ohio, 1837, JosephSmith and other church leaders, but
especially Joseph, endorsed a bank.
They called it the KirtlandSafety Society, which a
lot of members invested in.
Then, in what's known asthe Panic of 1837 in the U.
S., about 40 percent of banksacross America failed, including the
(42:32):
Kirtland Safety Society, and a lot ofchurch members lost a lot of money.
A lot of people looked at JosephSmith as the failure there, that
he was the one who was to blame.
Just to empathize a little bit, can youimagine the prophet of God stands up in
general conference and says, hey, we'regoing to endorse a bank, and we'd invite
you to invest your money in this bank.
And, I mean, I think a lot ofchurch members would do it.
(42:54):
And then imagine that that bank failed ayear later and you lost all your money.
Casey Paul Griffiths (43:00):
Hmm.
Scott Woodward (43:01):
How would that make you view the president of the church?
You might pause and say,hold on a second, right?
And I bet you'll find anassumption buried in your heart.
I think your assumption wouldgo something like this: True
prophets don't make financialerrors like that that hurt people.
True prophets don'tendorse banks that fail.
There might be an assumptionin your heart like that, right?
(43:22):
So our good example today is aman by the name of Brigham Young.
Maybe you've heard of him.
And here's what's coolabout Brigham Young.
Watch what he does here (43:30):
Let me read a quote from him.
He told this story later.
It's Journal of Discourses,volume 4, page 297-298.
He said this, “I can tell the peoplethat once in my life I felt a want
of confidence, a lack of confidencein brother Joseph Smith soon after
I became acquainted with him.
It was not concerning religious matters.
(43:51):
It was not about his revelations, but itwas in relation to his financiering, to
his managing the temporal affairs which heundertook.” Now, I'm not sure, by the way,
if this is about the Kirtland bank failingor not, or some other financial issue.
This could be aboutthat, but I'm not sure.
He's a little vague, but what he saw wasJoseph is not great at managing finances.
(44:13):
That was the reality that BrighamYoung was now confronted with.
I'll continue to quote him, “A feelingcame over me that Joseph was not right
in his financial management, though Ipresume the feeling did not last sixty
seconds and perhaps not thirty, but thatfeeling came on me once and once only
from the time I first knew him to the dayof his death.” So let's slow down here.
(44:34):
Here's an assumption that might havebeen in Brigham Young's heart: True
prophets don't make financial errors.
The reality he was confrontedwith was, I see Joseph Smith
making some financial errors.
Brigham Young is nowconfronted with a choice.
He can either throw out everythinghe believes about God, prophets, and
the church, or, watch what he does.
He says, “I repented of my unbelief,and that too very suddenly.
(44:57):
I repented about as quickly as I committedthe error.” And here's why: He said,
“It was not for me to question whetherJoseph was dictated by the Lord at all
times and under all circumstances or not.
He was called of God.
God dictated him.
And if God had a mind to leave Josephto himself and let him commit an
error, that was no business of mine.
(45:19):
It was not my prerogativeto call him in question with
regard to any act of his life.
He was God's servant, not mine.” Whoo.
So good, right?
Brigham Young's saying, listen, thereality I'm confronted with here is
Joseph Smith's making financial errors.
Now, what do I want to do about that?
Well, why can't God let hisprophet make financial errors?
Casey Paul Griffiths (45:42):
Mm-hmm.
Scott Woodward (45:43):
See what he did there really quick?
What'd he say?
60 seconds, maybe 30 secondshe was wrestling with that, and
then he came to that conclusion.
Casey Paul Griffiths (45:48):
Yeah.
Scott Woodward (45:48):
God can let him make financial errors if he wants to.
It's up to God whether he's goingto correct Joseph on this or not.
So there you go.
Maybe my assumption was wrong.
Prophets don't make financial errors.
You know what?
Why can't they make financial errors?
Of course they can.
It's God's prophet, not mine.
God can let them do that if He wants.
So good to just watch BrighamYoung just kind of wrestle with
(46:08):
that in 30 seconds or maybe 60.
Casey Paul Griffiths (46:11):
Mm-hmm.
Scott Woodward (46:11):
Others were not so fortunate.
Others got super angry at Joseph.
Some left for a while and came back, andothers left and never come back during
this season of this fallout with the bank,which precipitates the Kirtland apostasy,
we call it, because so many people leftthe church over dissatisfaction with
Joseph Smith, but not Brigham Young.
(46:32):
Not Brigham Young.
And that's a little glimpse into hissoul, a little glimpse into his mind, his
mental flexibility as he kind of wrestledwith Joseph making financial errors.
So, super cool.
Casey Paul Griffiths (46:44):
Very cool.
It kind of shows, you know,how he approached it with
the hermeneutic of faith.
He didn't go in lookingfor anything wrong.
When he sees something wrong, headjusts his thinking to say, is
this really part of being a prophet?
Is financiering always partof the prophetic office?
Scott Woodward (47:00):
Yeah.
Casey Paul Griffiths (47:00):
And even if he was wrong in how he did his
finance, he's still a prophet.
Scott Woodward (47:05):
Yeah.
Casey Paul Griffiths (47:06):
This really isn't my business.
This isn't something I have to expenda lot of mental energy worrying about.
So it's a great model of how you canconfront a problem and rather than
having your whole world shatter,you just pause and say, well, let
me think about this for a second.
Maybe my thinking was wrong, andif I adjust, I can find a way to
(47:26):
reconcile this, and most of the timeyou will find a way to reconcile it.
Scott Woodward (47:30):
Yeah.
And he didn't go to the other extreme,trying to be like, nope, Joseph didn't
make any mistakes, you know, try todefend the prophet tooth and nail,
like try to uphold some false standardof prophetic infallibility, right?
He's just like, oh,prophets can make mistakes.
That's fine.
If this is one of them, cool.
I'll let God deal with it.
Not my bag.
So just a nice sweet spot offaith, but not fanaticism.
(47:52):
He didn't run to anyextreme to defend Joseph.
He just kind of said, I'm goingto let God handle that one.
So super cool.
Great example.
Casey Paul Griffiths (48:00):
Yeah.
Scott Woodward (48:00):
Well, Casey, that's a brief run through of
this skill of mental flexibility.
We think it's super crucial toa life of durable discipleship.
Anything else you want to say about thisas we kind of wrap all this up today?
Casey Paul Griffiths (48:15):
Just repeating the same points, that when you come
across something that maybe changesyour paradigm or shifts you a little
bit, it doesn't mean it has todestroy everything that you believe.
You change your assumptions, you move,and you're a little bit mentally nimble.
Like, we always talk abouta person staying consistent,
and that's important, right?
Scott Woodward (48:35):
Some ways.
Casey Paul Griffiths (48:36):
In some ways.
But It's also important to be flexible,too, in order to adjust things when
new evidence comes around so that yousee things and it doesn't break your
worldview of what's going on around.
So, yeah, I hope this has been helpful,and hopefully you've seen some good
examples from church history where peopleget confronted with new facts and they
(48:56):
respond in good ways and positive ways.
We're not making any summary judgmentsabout the people that we know here.
No final judgments.
We're just basically saying,hey, here's an example of
someone who is mentally flexible.
Here's an example of someone who wasn't.
And here's why this will bless and benefityou in your life and in your faith.
Scott Woodward (49:15):
Awesome.
Well, thanks for joining us, everybody.
Stay tuned next time.
We'll tackle our next skill.
Thank you for listening to thisepisode of Church History Matters.
Join us next time as we introducethe next skill we believe to be
vital to seeking truth and preservingfaith: the skill of putting facts,
(49:36):
especially shocking or uncomfortablefacts, into their historical,
theological, or cultural contexts.
This skill of contextualizing factsis essential in helping us know what
assumptions to bring to those factsso we know what meaning to give them.
If you're enjoying Church HistoryMatters, we'd appreciate it if you
could take a moment to subscribe, rate,review, and comment on the podcast.
(50:01):
That makes us easier to find.
Today's episode was produced byScott Woodward and edited by Nick
Galieti and Scott Woodward, with shownotes and transcript by Gabe Davis.
Church History Matters is a podcastof Scripture Central, a nonprofit
which exists to help build enduringfaith in Jesus Christ by making
Latter-day Saint scripture and churchhistory accessible, comprehensible,
(50:22):
and defensible to people everywhere.
For more resources to enhance yourgospel study, go to scripturecentral.org,
where everything is availablefor free because of the generous
donations of people like you.
And while we try very hard to behistorically and doctrinally accurate
in what we say on this podcast, pleaseremember that all views expressed in
this and every episode are our viewsalone and do not necessarily reflect the
(50:46):
views of Scripture Central or The Churchof Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.
Thank you so much for beinga part of this with us.
Popular Podcasts
Dateline NBC
Current and classic episodes, featuring compelling true-crime mysteries, powerful documentaries and in-depth investigations. Follow now to get the latest episodes of Dateline NBC completely free, or subscribe to Dateline Premium for ad-free listening and exclusive bonus content: DatelinePremium.com
24/7 News: The Latest
The latest news in 4 minutes updated every hour, every day.
Therapy Gecko
An unlicensed lizard psychologist travels the universe talking to strangers about absolutely nothing. TO CALL THE GECKO: follow me on https://www.twitch.tv/lyleforever to get a notification for when I am taking calls. I am usually live Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays but lately a lot of other times too. I am a gecko.