- Kendall Buchanan on A Preposterously Complimentary Review of the Book of Abraham: “Jonathan, Do you mind explaining more? I’m curious to hear what you mean about BoA.” Jul 17, 20:48
- on A Preposterously Complimentary Review of the Book of Abraham: “Thanks for this post, Kendall. I’ve occasionally seen references to Scott Alexander but I wasn’t aware of the book review. For what it’s worth, I continue to think that the Book of Abraham is one our more interesting and important books of scripture, and that questioning the accuracy of the Egyptian translation gets everything backwards – not that anyone here is doing that. I’m looking forward to your next post.” Jul 17, 19:10
- on A Preposterously Complimentary Review of the Book of Abraham: “Would not be surprised if the author is a former member or has family that are members.” Jul 17, 19:05
- on A Preposterously Complimentary Review of the Book of Abraham: “Stephen C, Stephen F, Yeah, I think he was being more generous than the South Park quote suggests. In a follow-up post I’d like to touch on another theme the reviewer implicitly grapples with: when Mormonism is so “obviously incorrect”, how does it stay so resilient and continue to thrive?” Jul 17, 15:58
- on A Preposterously Complimentary Review of the Book of Abraham: “My sense is that the reviewer is engaging in a more sophisticated grappling with a similar question that the South Park episode seemed to ask in a more crass way. Is there something about Mormonism that produces the outcome of it’s very nice people? I think that’s an interesting question too and am glad the reviewer is interested in the topic.” Jul 17, 14:11
- on A Preposterously Complimentary Review of the Book of Abraham: “I’m a big Scott Alexander fan, so I read this Substack when I saw it in my Inbox. One thing I’ll add is that, while he’s not going to be joining the Church anytime soon, Alexander’s take on the apologetics arguments is actually more generous and sophisticated than most online rationalist’s responses to the BoA (which is usually just some version of “Lol, John Gee is dumb and Robert Ritner is cool.”) So it’s a little more generous than the South Park angle of “this is patently dumb but Mormons are nice and that’s what matters.”” Jul 17, 13:35
- on Spiritually Inspirational Art by Not-So-Inspirational Artists: “Adam F: Good example. RLD: WRT the King of Assyria, I do think the idea of God using bad people to, say, punish his chosen people (Assyria is going to Assyria after all) is less complicated than God using somebody *to create an inspired work of art.*” Jul 17, 13:26
- on A Preposterously Complimentary Review of the Book of Abraham: “Thanks, Kendall. Though I did not read the review in it’s entirety, it addresses a lot of themes I’ve been interested in and have posted about. https://www.timesandseasons.org/index.php/2024/03/a-secular-case-for-the-church/ I’ve long thought that concluding line from the South Park episode the reviewer cites was important, but I do get the challenges of believers engaging in claims like these.” Jul 17, 10:13
- on A Review: Educating Zion: The Diaries of BYU President Ernest L. Wilkinson, 1952–1971: “So, it’s not like there’s a proven formula for turning a religious college into a nationally prominent university while maintaining its religious mission. A lot of colleges that started on that path have preserved at most a nominal religious identity and only a few ultimately succeeded. It makes no sense to dismiss concerns about secularization as paranoia when secularization has been one of the most important influences on society for the last century or more.” Jul 16, 19:36
