Comments on: Dispensations

By: John A. Coltharp

John A. Coltharp — Thu, 11 Feb 2010 07:43:56 +0000

You bring up an interesting point: Dispensation Boundaries. It seems like boundaries of “dispensations” are simply a matter of personal perspective. Who can really draw an absolute line anywhere in time marking the beginning or ending of a dispensation? Obviously, key events are on absolute dates, such as the First Vision, etc. But there is always so much leading up to these events (such as the Spirit revealing things to reformers, pilgrims, founding fathers, etc), that still, the starting time of the dispensation is blurry, or in other words, is simply a matter of personal perspective.

From Orson Pratt’s perspective, there have been “many hundreds” of dispensations. (See “Questions and Answers on Doctrine,” The Seer, vol. 2, no. 1 [Washington City, D. C.: Orson Pratt, Jan. 1854], p. 204.)

David W. Patten offered some helpful insight on what constitutes a dispensation, which may make it easier in determining the “boundaries” of each. See “To the Saints scattered abroad,” Elders’ Journal (Far West, Missouri: Joseph Smith Jr., July 1838), pp. 39-42.

By: Jonathan Green

Jonathan Green — Tue, 09 Feb 2010 14:52:32 +0000

Thanks for your comments. To reiterate, while we should acknowledge the costs of dispensational thinking, we should also acknowledge the positive work that it does for us. Sectarian and dispensational boundaries give us a manageable field to work with, or in some cases a fresh field that hasn’t already been ploughed over for millennia.

James, I agree that if start looking for spiritual affinity before the Reformation, we’re much more likely to find it among monastics than among the heretics that are often held up as precursors of the Restoration.

By: Kent Larsen

Kent Larsen — Tue, 09 Feb 2010 10:49:18 +0000

One interesting example of this dispensational thinking is B. H. Robert’s Introduction to the 7-volume History of the Church. There Roberts goes to great lengths in attempting to demonstrate the existence of the great apostasy from the work of protestant eclesiastical historians and from the writings of the early Church fathers. Its really an odd work for LDS doctrinal exposition, precisely because it shows an unusual familiarity with pre-Joseph Smith Christian writing.

By: James Olsen

James Olsen — Mon, 08 Feb 2010 23:29:23 +0000

Very intriguing. If I understand you correctly, I especially enjoyed your positive note about the re-boot doing us the service of eliminating the huge cognitive burden of remaining engaged in and accountable to the past frameworks, dogmas and debates. It can surely be healthy. But as you note, our importing from these curtained off periods is a great source of creativity and contemporary renewal. I’d love to hear more of your thoughts concerning what from the medieval period might serve as positive-importing-fodder for our Mormon thinking. I personally find the massive medieval phenomenon of monasticism – a form of consecration that could remain complimentary with the rest of society – to be an un-mined treasure.

By: Raymond Takashi Swenson

Raymond Takashi Swenson — Mon, 08 Feb 2010 19:11:26 +0000

My recollection is that there are many quotes of Joseph Smith bemoaning the tendency of the early Latter-day Saints to hold on to many of the traditional beliefs and views of historical Christianity, to the extent they would “shatter like glass” when he presented them with a reboot of the doctrines that revise our understanding of the Bible.

One of the remarkable things of the last few decades has been the recognition by scholars, both Mormon and non, of Joseph’s revival–or restoration–of teachings that have an ancient pedigree, such as by Nibley, Bloom, and Margaret Barker. In other cases, non-LDS scholars have, without referring to Joseph Smith, joined him in criticizing much of the Christian tradition as a gloss that obscures the brilliance of the original Christian vision contained in the Bible, including N.T. Wright and the advocates of Open Theism.

For Mormons, wading through Augustine and Aquinas is not an effort to make the Gospel measure up to the standards of Aristotle and Plato, but is mainly useful in speaking the foreign language of traditional Christians. Modern science does not rely on the authority of Aristotle’s science, and picks and chooses among his approximate contemporaries to find kindred spirits like Archimedes, Democritus and Aritosthenes. Only a centuries old religious tradition preserves Aristotle’s thought as authoritative in any sense.

When Christ expressed condemnation of those who had obscured his doctrine with the commandments of mere men, we are bound to take it seriously and be forewarned of that contamination. When Nephi cautions that “plain and precious things” in the Bible have been obscured by a tradition of probably well-meaning but uninspired men, who have taken away that plainness through imposing an official interpretation, prudence leads to skepticism toward the encrustation of official creeds built up from the 4th Century forward.

By: Craig H.

Craig H. — Mon, 08 Feb 2010 17:44:43 +0000

I like what you say about dispensational thinking almost negating the value, or nature, of life and thought at a given time, at least as people of that time knew them. When we look at life as people of a time saw it, I think we actually learn a lot more than when we impose our frail ultimate-meaning structures upon them.

By: Steve Fleming

Steve Fleming — Mon, 08 Feb 2010 17:01:14 +0000

It helps in that you don’t have to be a scholar to be a Christian. Sola scriptura was a big movement in the early 1800s. I also see the implications for millenarianism. Christians have been expecting Christ’s return at any moment since the beginning. But dispensational thinking wipes that all away, all that matters is what God told Joseph Smith.