Mormonism: What Everyone Needs to Know (2020)
Oxford University Press
Covering the origins, history, and modern challenges of the church, Mormonism: What Everyone Needs to Know offers readers a brief, authoritative guide to one of the fastest growing faith groups of the twenty-first century in a reader-friendly format. Written by a believer and the premier scholar of the Latter-day Saints faith, this remarkably readable introduction provides a sympathetic but unstinting account of one of the few religious traditions to maintain its vitality and growth in an era of widespread disaffiliation.
The Oxford Handbook of Mormonism (2015)
Oxford University Press
Scholarly interest in Mormon theology, history, texts, and practices-what makes up the field now known as Mormon studies-has reached unprecedented levels, making it one of the fastest-growing subfields in religious studies. In this volume, Terryl Givens and Philip Barlow, two leading scholars of Mormonism, have brought together 45 of the top experts in the field to construct a collection of essays that offers a comprehensive overview of scholarship on Mormons.This book begins with a section on Mormon history, perhaps the most well-developed area of Mormon studies. Other sections examine revelation and scripture, church structure and practice, theology, society, and culture. The final two sections look at Mormonism in a larger context. The authors examine Mormon expansion across the globe-focusing on Mormonism in Latin America, the Pacific, Europe, and Asia-in addition to the interaction between Mormonism and other social systems, such as law, politics, and other faiths.
“This volume is cause for genuine rejoicing.”
The Columbia Sourcebook for Mormons in the United States (2014)
Columbia University Press
This anthology offers rare access to key original documents illuminating Mormon history, theology, and culture in the United States from the nineteenth century to today. Brief introductions describe the theological significance of each text and its reflection of the practices, issues, and challenges that have defined and continue to define the Mormon community. These documents balance mainstream and peripheral thought and religious experience, institutional and personal perspective, and theoretical and practical interpretation, representing pivotal moments in LDS history and correcting decades of misinformation and stereotype.
“Students of Mormon history would do well to examine the faith and its history through these revealing sources, and I hope the book finds its way into numerous syllabi.”
The Book of Mormon: A Very Short Introduction (2009)
Oxford University Press
Givens examines the Book of Mormon in terms of the claims that its narrators make for its historical genesis, its purpose as a sacred text, and its meaning for an audience which shifts over the course of the history it unfolds. The author traces five governing themes in particular-revelation, Christ, Zion, scripture, and family-and analyzes the Book's central doctrines and teachings. Givens also provides samples of a cast of characters that number in the hundreds, and analyzes representative passages from a work that encompasses tragedy, poetry, sermons, visions, family histories and military chronicles. Finally, this introduction surveys the contested origins and production of a work held by millions to be scripture, and reviews the scholarly debates that address questions of the record's historicity.
“Taking the Book of Mormon on its own terms, Terryl Givens offers a complex, reverent analysis of a powerful epic history.”
Joseph Smith: Reappraisals After Two Centuries (2008)
Oxford University Press
In this volume, fifteen scholars offer essays on how to interpret and understand Smith and his legacy. Including essays by both Mormons and non-Mormons, this wide-ranging collection is the premier survey of contemporary scholarly opinion on the extraordinary man who started one of the fastest growing religious traditions in the modern world.
The Latter-Day Saint Experience in America (2003)
Greenwood
An overview of Mormon history, doctrine, organization, worship, and culture. Part of a series of Religions in America, it is intended by the publisher to "serve as a quick reference for someone looking up facts or as an easily accessible resource for those needing a basic introduction to the religion(s), as practiced in the United States.
“A most sophisticated, yet accessible and comprehensive, single-volume treatment of LDS ideology and practice.”