Link to Book:
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An Analytical
History Of The LDS Church
in
five volumes, by Kent Huff
An
issue-oriented intellectual history of the LDS church, exploring some of the
great questions concerning human life on earth as raised and answered by the
history of the restoration of Christ's church.
Some
questions:
●What did early LDS
leaders teach about the need and correct methods for concerted action in making
the restoration of the church a successful reality? What effects have
ideological issues and factions, inside and outside the church, had on the
course of LDS church history?
●How did the LDS church
affect slavery and the Civil War, and how was the LDS church affected by those
issues and events?
●How did church members
govern themselves before Utah statehood, in the absence of access to most
normal government functions?
●What do the historical
experiences of the LDS church teach us about God's concept of individual
freedom?
●How has the New
Testament concept of individual charity been woven into church history? How
does it relate to attempts at concerted action?
●What is the growth
history of the LDS church and what is the situation today? What should it be?
What do those statistics tell us about church history and doctrine?
●What ideas for
stimulating growth have been tried, and which have NOT been tried? Are there
theological or practical reasons for the church currently being in a no-growth
situation?
●How does the 2020 A.D.
LDS church compare with the 33 A.D. Church which Christ himself organized
during his lifetime? If there are important differences, what does that mean?
Book
summaries in publication sequence:
Joseph Smith’s United Order: A Non-Communalistic
Interpretation (1988,
2020)
Joseph Smith staunchly
maintained the political and religious freedom of the Saints and resisted every
attempt to require some religious-based communalism which might limit
individual property rights and other freedoms. Unfortunately, the theologians
of centralization and priestcraft are always active, whether in religion or in
government, and Joseph Smith resisted them all. As a further misfortune, Joseph's
vigorous teachings and efforts in the cause of freedom have been largely
forgotten. There was indeed a "united order" or "united
firm" set up by Joseph Smith, but it was nothing more than a small common-law
partnership organized to conduct central church business before it was even politically
possible to have such a thing as a corporation of the president to handle these
matters as we do today.
Brigham
Young’s United Order: A
Contextual Interpretation, Vol. 1, Main Presentation (1998, 2020)
The general theme of
this book concerns all the unusual ideas and actions that needed to be invented
by church leaders to adapt for the fact that the church members often had no
access to ordinary government processes which would allow them to solve their normal
social problems in a straightforward and constitutional way in Utah. This difficult
situation occurred for a short time in Nauvoo and Winter Quarters before the
Saints even made it to Utah. Also, wagon trains and handcart companies have
their own special needs for governance. The first 22 years the Saints were in
Utah, from 1847 to 1869, were especially difficult, and their lack of access to
ordinary government processes continued until they were finally granted
statehood in 1896. To be more specific, for many years there was no legal way
to own land, form lasting business organizations, enforce criminal law, etc.
Some of the church-invented solutions to these governing difficulties are known
by such often-misunderstood terms as united order, blood atonement, Adam-god,
etc. Without a fairly deep understanding of the practical problems which the
Saints faced during those years, these unusual terms are incomprehensible to
modern-day church members.
Brigham
Young’s United Order: A
Contextual Interpretation, Vol. 2, Related Anomalies and Side Issues (1998, 2020)
The individual opinions
of 9 different church leaders are explored on some of the more unusual
discussion topics of their time – united orders, polygamy, blood atonement,
Adam-god, etc.
Creating The
Millennium: Social Forces and Church Growth in the 21st Century (2004, 2020)
Spreading the knowledge
and the benefits of the gospel is what brings about a condition known as Zion,
or the Millennium. This book explores the statistics of growth for the LDS
church, and suggests some creative measures that might be taken to speed up the
spread of the gospel and the growth of the church. The book raises the question
as to why church growth rates have been shrinking since about 1960 until they
have reached zero, or nearly so, but the book is unable to suggest an answer.
Is The Church As True
As The Gospel? A Constitutional Approach (2020)
This book finally
approaches head-on the question of why church growth is approximately at zero. The
simple but unexpected and shocking answer is that while Christ's original
church was perfectly adapted for spreading worldwide, the current version of
the church is not correctly adapted. Increasing the pressure on members to
achieve more with a faulty message would be counterproductive. Just as the
idiosyncratic and tribal nature of the law of Moses kept that religion from
spreading to anyone besides the Jews and other Israelites, the church today has
many of the same features as that Jewish church, and cannot practically grow
beyond the current idiosyncratic and tribal nature of current pioneer-stock
Mormons who are still bound together more because of their own pioneer Exodus heritage
than by the force of actual gospel teachings and practices. Only when today's
church reverts back to the original configuration of the church as it existed
just after the life of Christ, and as Joseph Smith restored it, can today's
church expand any further or have any hope of bringing the world to a
millennial condition as predicted in the Scriptures.
The largest change
needed is to end today's Old Testament tithing and professional priesthood system,
and replace all of it with individualized New Testament charity practices. That
basically means dismantling the current headquarters unit and dispersing
essentially all priesthood and operating authority to the stake levels. That
would return us to the original New Testament church organization pattern. That
localization of everything would allow the church to quickly spread worldwide
and to begin a rapid preparation for Zion and the millennial condition. This is
consistent with the scripture-based concept of post-millennialism wherein
church activity demonstrates the power of the gospel and brings the world to a
near-millennial state, a condition which would allow Christ to come and give
his approval and complete the process.
Five historical phases can be identified
for the modern church:
1.
The original church is restored and remains intact for 66 years.
2.
The decision is made to follow the path of the Catholic Church to
reinstitute the law of Moses, essentially creating the Catholic Church version
2. A majority of church
leaders in 1896 took advantage of the chaotic practical and ideological
conditions to confuse and exploit the Saints. Where Christ had fastidiously
resisted all temptations of the devil concerning potential earthly power, the
fourth set of church leaders, led by Wilford Woodruff, eagerly embraced those
temptations. Note that these church leaders took action only AFTER the church's
major existential crises were over and it had finally become profitable to
exploit the Saints when they finally had some income beyond that needed for their
bare survival. Brigham Young feared this very outcome could occur when the
Saints emerged from the mere subsistence level.
3.
By 1960 the law of Moses is fully implemented and the church begins to
die.
4.
Zero net growth is reached by 2018, and the dead husk of the LDS Church
lingers on. Its futile efforts to build an earthly empire languish. Unless it
chooses to "restore the restoration" it can go no further. It might
consider using greater levels of police-state-style coercion to expand its
earthly empire, but, more likely, such policies would hasten its disintegration
in a free nation. The no-growth equilibrium point it has achieved could go on
indefinitely until there is some outside disrupting factor such as general
social unrest. The China virus has shown how quickly the church could become
socially irrelevant.
5. Ideally, the church would completely
reform itself and experience the great future successes prophesied.
