Skip to main content

2011 FAIR Conference


            Last year I attended the FAIR Conference for the first time and really enjoyed it. So this year I am going back. For those interested in Mormon Studies, or (more particularly) Mormon Apologetics, I strongly encourage you to attend.

            Last year there was ground-breaking research unveiled for the first time on the Kirtland Egyptian Papers and their connection to the Book of Abraham. This year will feature several speakers on a variety of topics. Here are just a few presentations that interest me in particular:

Stephen D. Ricks, “The Sacred Embrace in Ancient Egyptian Religion and Art”

Brant Gardner, “The Gift and Power: Translating the Book of Mormon”

Steven C. Harper, “Accounts of the First Vision”

Newell Bringhurst, “The 2012 Presidential Race and the Mormon Question” (As a political science major, I can’t help but get excited when my major and my hobby intersect like this!)

Don Bradley, “‘President Joseph Has Translated a Portion’: Solving the Mystery of the Kinderhook Plates” (This one sounds very promising…though I fear the title might be promising too much…I hope not though!)

Paul Fields, “Book of Mormon ‘Wordprint’ Analysis: How to do it wrong…and how to do it right” (My very good friend from high school, who recently finished his undergrad at BYU and has received a full-ride scholarship [or something like that] to Harvard for his graduate work, helped collect the research and data for this presentation)

Chris Watkins, “Excavating the Text: Archaeological Expectations for the Book of Mormon Peoples”

            There are several more presentations as well. The FAIR Bookstore also sets up shop at the conference and offers a lot of books as a discount price.

            For more information, click here. To get your tickets, click here.
Labels:

Comments

  1. Neal, expect to pleasantly surprised! =)

    BTW, how do you pronounce your last name?

    ReplyDelete

  2. Hey Don!

    Thanks for taking the time to visit my little, largely irrelevant, space on the internet. ;)

    I really look forward to what you have to offer this year, since the Kinderhook plates remain (in my view) one of the more confusing events in early LDS History. I hope you really have solved the mystery (also, I hope my comments in the posting didn't offend you, I just try to temper my expectations sometimes).

    My last name is pronounced Rapp-LEE. I know the "Y" in there really throws people off, they want to say it Rappl-EYE.

    ReplyDelete

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

The 15 “Best Books” to Read BEFORE Having a Faith Crisis

Elder M. Russell Ballard recently stressed that it is important for Gospel educators to be well-informed on controversial topics, not only by studying the scriptures and Church materials, but also by reading “the best LDS scholarship available.” I personally think it is imperative in today’s world for every Latter-day Saint—not just Gospel educators—to make an effort to be informed on both controversial issues as well as knowing reliable faith-building information as well.
(Given that Elder Ballard’s CES address was published to general Church membership in the Ensign, I think it’s safe to say that Church leadership also feels this way.)
An important step in the process of getting informed is reading the 11 Gospel Topic essays and getting familiar with their contents. But what’s next? How can a person learn more about these and other topics? What are the “best books” (D&C 88:118) or “the best LDS scholarship available”?
Here are 15 suggestions.
1. Michael R. Ash, Shaken Faith S…
16 comments
Read more

Responding to the New Video on Nahom as Archaeological Evidence for the Book of Mormon

Many of my (few) readers have probably already seen the new video by Book of Mormon Central on Nahom as archaeological evidence for the Book of Mormon, starring my good friend (and co-author on a related paper) Stephen Smoot. If you haven’t, check it out:


As usual, comments sections wherever this video is shared have been flooded by Internet ex-Mormons insisting this not evidence for the Book of Mormon. I’ve actually had a few productive conversations with some reasonable people who don’t think Nahom is, by itself, compelling evidence—and I can understand that. But the insistence that Nahom is not evidence at all is just, frankly, absurd. So I’ll just go ahead and preempt about 90% of future responses to this post by responding to the most common arguments against Nahom/NHM now:
1. The Book of Mormon is false, therefore there can be no evidence, therefore this is not evidence. First, this is circular reasoning. It assumes the conclusion (Book of Mormon is false) which the evidence pre…
108 comments
Read more

New Paper on Isaiah in the Book of Mormon

Joseph M. Spencer, an adjunct professor at the BYU religion department, recently published a paper in the non-LDS peer review journal Relegere: Studies in Religion and Reception, titled, “Isaiah 52 in the Book of Mormon: Note’s on Isaiah’s Reception History.” Spencer is a young scholar who is doing exciting stuff on the Book of Mormon from a theological perspective.
The paper is described as follows in the abstract: Despite increasing recognition of the importance of Mormonism to American religion, little attention has been given to the novel uses of Isaiah in foundational Mormon texts. This paper crosses two lines of inquiry: the study of American religion, with an eye to the role played in it by Mormonism, and the study of Isaiah’s reception history. It looks at the use of Isa 52:7–10 in the Book of Mormon, arguing that the volume exhibits four irreducibly distinct approaches to the interpretation of Isaiah, the interrelations among which are explicitly meant to speak to nineteent…
1 comment
Read more