Seminar Website

Just adding a public note here with a link to the Mormon Theology Seminar’s new home page:

www.mormontheologyseminar.org

Also, here’s a link to a podcast about this seminar and the upcoming conference.

Alma 32:37-43: The Summary that Wasn’t

Well, a very short discussion left me with little to summarize. But I stumbled upon something else that I thought I’d share.

Alma 32:37-43

Sorry this got a little long. . .

Discussion summary: Alma 32.30-36

I had a rather crazy week last week, so sorry for not posting this earlier. Since we’re rather late in the seminar now, let me try to summarize (“muse about” would be more accurate here…) both this week’s and previous weeks’ discussion as it relates to the first seminar question:

What does Alma 32 teach us about exercising faith?

Faith is something that occurs before the attaining of knowledge. Faith is what sets the process of the attaining of knowledge in motion (as the frequency of the term begin attests). Once faith is exercised, and the word/seed is given place to do its thing, then the word/seed reproduces its goodness.

Alma 32:30-36

Structure

The phrase “swelleth, and sprouteth, and beginneth to grow” in verses 30 (twice) and 33 (once) seems significant. Also, “sprouteth and beginneth to grow” occurs at the end of verse 30. I’m not sure what to make of this partial occurrence. Verses 30-33 also seem enveloped in a double occurrence of the notion of “perfect knowledge” at the end of verse 29 and the beginning of verse 34. Based on these observations, if we look more closely at verses 29-34a as their own unit, we might read this according to the following chiastic structuring:

Discussion Summary: Alma 32: 26–29

An indexing project I’ve been waiting for all summer arrived this week. Of course, after taking two months to send it to me, the press sent it with a two-week turnaround deadline (for the absolutely final version). I’m hoping to have the first draft completed by Monday so I can send it to the author and then sort through the rich discussion from this week. Thanks to all.

Alma 32: 26–29

I hope the discussion Adam initiated last week concerning the relationships between the key terms of this chapter will continue, as I found it very useful last week. In that vein, I have tried to focus the majority my thoughts around exploring specific phrases and words.

Discussion Summary – Alma 32:21-25

Below, I’ll try to summarize some key points from last week’s discussion with the help of an overly reductive schema. It may, I hope, help to codify the relationship between some of the things we’ve been thinking about.

For Joe’s sake (wink) let me begin with a little bit of formalization.

Alma 32:21-25

If we were to risk definitions of some key terms and then constructed these definitions by referring only to information presented thus far in the chapter, what might we venture?

Discussion Summary: Alma 32:14-20

Because most all of our discussion this week turned on the three “withouts” of verse 16, I spent some time trying to formalize/diagrammatize/mathematicize that without within the broader structure of faith I see unfolding in Alma 32. As such, I worked out the following “matheme” or diagram