Review
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Title: Let’s Talk About Faith and Intellect
Author: Terryl Givens
Publisher: Deseret Book
Genre: Devotional
Year Published: 2022
Number of pages: 134
Binding: Paperback
ISBN13: 978-1-63993-041-8
Price: $11.99
Reviewed by Dennis Clark for the Association for Mormon Letters
This book is one of a series, according to the back cover, of “small, approachable books on important Latter-day Saint topics. Each one is written by a trusted, faithful scholar…” So far, the topics covered are Polygamy, Religion and Mental Health, the Book of Abraham, the Translation of the Book of Mormon (coming early 2023), and the Law of Consecration, by Steven C. Harper. If Givens and Harper are examples of the “trusted, faithful scholars” who are writing the other books, this series will prove very useful. If you are curious, the page listing the series invites you to “visit DesBook.com/LetsTalk.”
Givens divides his discourse in Let’s Talk About Faith and Intellect into two sections. Section I: Prologue has two chapters:
- Myths and Straw Men: Reason and Christian Beginnings
- Inquisitions and intellect in Christian History
Section II: Restoration has 6 chapters:
- Heart and Mind United
- The Problem of God, Good, and Evil
- The Stories We Tell
- Scripture
- The “New Mormon History”
- The Poverty of Secularism
Givens has a knack for unearthing the most interesting, often compelling, evidence in his research. In what he calls “restoration thought,” he is able to follow a thread at length, demonstrating that any given insight, any statement, is not a flash-in-the-pan, not a one-off, and not unrelated to the broad sweep of Latter-day scripture.
In chapter 4, I found what is for me, the most trenchant explanation of how faith and intellect buttress one another. Givens begins by explaining the problem of God, Good and Evil: “The classic problem of evil is simply expressed: evil exists; either God is unable to prevent it (in which case He is not omnipotent, perfectly powerful), or He is unwilling to prevent it (in which case He is not omnibenevolent, perfectly good).” Givens notes that most Christian scholars have opted to preserve God’s omnipotence. This fits with my reading of Calvin’s Institutes of the Christian Religion from way back in grad school. But it is Givens’ handling of this dilemma that I find most compelling.
He says, “Restoration thought embraces the other horn of the dilemma.” After quoting Joseph Smith, from his funeral discourse for King Follett, Givens summarizes it thus: “So the core of our being, spirit, or ‘intelligence,’ is not something that God made. The scope of our innate potential for good and evil is tied, in essential ways, to our nature…” (49-50).
This radical embrace of what most other Christian commentators dismiss helped me grasp an answer that I had only vaguely felt. For years I have understood that our agency requires free will, but I have not, before now, heard it expressed so clearly. Our heavenly parents did not create us, but they have given us an arena in which to become what we both need and want to become. Our scriptures are filled with expressions of doubt about this, usually in the form of a screed like Alma’s in Alma 40.26: “But behold, an awful death cometh upon the wicked; for they die as to things pertaining to things of righteousness … they are cast out, and consigned to partake of the fruits of their labors, or their works, which have been evil…” Alma speaks at great length to his son Corianton on this topic, but he speaks in strictly binary terms, almost as if he were a Calvinist.
Joseph Smith spoke of eternal progression, of moving from glory to glory, of our ability to change: “All the minds and spirits that God ever sent into the world are susceptible of enlargement and improvement. The relationship we have with God places us in a situation to advance in knowledge” (59). This ability to change fits us to live in a world always in flux, a world in which change is a constant. Thus, to confidently proclaim what even God will not speak, that, for example, there can be no progression between kingdoms in the afterlife, is to speak against the entire concept of agency and accountability. And Givens does full justice to the intricacies of this resolution. I can’t do that in this review, but if you are interested, read the book.
I note, in closing, that Givens includes as chapter 7, “The ‘New Mormon History,'” which is a fine example of the lengths to which he will go in pursuit of his thesis, examining all aspects of the relation between faith and intellect. The, “New Mormon History” has been problematic for people who see Joseph Smith as a Mormon “Saint Joseph,” a role he would never have claimed for himself. As Givens makes clear, Joseph Smith was a man with the same foibles and urges, and appetites that plague us all, and he strove to overcome them and grow.