Review
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Title: Seven Gospels: The Many Lives of Christ in the Book of Mormon
Authors: Adam S. Miller, Rosalynde F. Welch
Publisher: Deseret Book
Genre: Religious Non-fiction
Year Published: 2023
Number of Pages: 149
Format: Paperback
ISBN: 978-1-63993-205-4
Price: $16.99
Reviewed by Conor Hilton for the Association of Mormon Letters
Seven Gospels: The Many Lives of Christ in the Book of Mormon by Adam S. Miller and Rosalynde F. Welch is a personal, rich, conversation of a book. Adam and Rosalynde draw on years of careful, close reading of the Book of Mormon to explore what seven different people in the Book of Mormon have to teach about Jesus Christ—Mary, Benjamin, Abinadi, Alma, Abish, Samuel, and the Brother of Jared. The book benefits from the collective years of careful reading that Rosalynde and Adam bring to the table as they draw connections and parallels between these various ‘gospels.’ I could feel the sharp, incisive work happening between the lines, even as it’s presented in an easy-going, warm manner.
The book is structured as a series of letters between Rosalynde and Adam. Each chapter, or ‘gospel,’ contains two letters, opening with a letter from Rosalynde to Adam, followed by Adam’s reply to Rosalynde. This structure is key to the conversational nature of the book and works much to its advantage, rendering it quite accessible, even when the ideas and insights are new and may otherwise feel somewhat challenging.
At times, I wish the structure had leaned a bit more into the epistolary possibilities—mixing up the length of the letters, changing up the order of who wrote first and who responded, maybe having multiple letters from one writer in a row, etc.—but I recognize that my own proclivity for structural experimentation is not shared by everyone. I also occasionally wanted a bit sharper, more constructively combative, engagement between Rosalynde and Adam—disagreeing with each other, bringing up counterpoints, etc. But, again, recognize that that may be me imposing my own writing and dialogue style on others, where it would be unnatural (as you do indeed get a sense of the “real-world substance of [their] long-time friendship” (8)).
However, the letter structure worked brilliantly to embed in the very structure of the book Adam and Rosalynde’s assertion that “there is, of course, nothing definitive about the work we do here. Our work is scholarly and exploratory, not authoritative” (8). Many such books include some variation on this disclaimer and then proceed to speak definitively and authoritatively. The epistolary format renders the whole book ‘open-ended,’ that is, a slice of the dialogue and conversation between Rosalynde and Adam. While the book may end, the structure suggests that we have only glimpsed a small sample of a conversation and collaboration that started years before the book begins and will continue for many more years to come. Truly impressed that they were able to structure the book in a way that honors that introductory assertion and still feels valuable and insightful.
I’d be remiss if I didn’t also mention a few of the scriptural insights from this slim volume. Adam writes about Alma that, “For all the good that can be done from the judgment seat, Alma is keenly aware that the legal power he wields as a judge exists in tension with the power of God’s word. In some vital way, his power as a judge undercuts his power as a preacher” (74). I love this insight! I had never connected Alma’s experience as judge with the coercive power of the state, to his later observation that the word has more power than the sword to transform people. But I love the way Adam thinks through this here.
Later, in her discussion of Abish, Rosalynde writes that, “I think the gospel of Abish brings some theological rigor to the idea of joy. In particular, I think it tells us that joy comes from reseeing our life’s movement toward death as the image of Christ himself” (87). As someone often preoccupied with what ‘joy’ might mean in a theological context, I greatly appreciated Rosalynde’s thinking here. I’d never quite connected Abish and the founding of Lamanite Christianity in the Book of Mormon with joy in this way, and am eager to ponder more on this insight.
And one final, provocative assertion, again, from Rosalynde, considering the Brother of Jared in relation to Samuel. She says, “When we banish God from our world and look for him only with a telescope, expecting that he is far away, he appears threatening and angry. When we instead look for him close by, when we use a magnifying glass instead of a telescope, we see that his hand is extended in blessing, not in violence” (124). I am interested in thinking through the implications here and exploring this insight in other contexts. The idea that our perspective, or view, of God is one of the keys to whether we perceive God as loving or violent is certainly provocative. Much to ponder!
Rosalynde F. Welch and Adam S. Miller’s Seven Gospels: The Many Lives of Christ in the Book of Mormon is a lovely, open-ended conversation of a book. A great way to start the year’s study of the Book of Mormon, thinking about what insights can be gained from careful, close, collaborative reading, like that modeled here between two disciple-scholar-friends. May we all find conversation partners as insightful, warm, and generous, as Adam and Rosalynde.