07AR12-44

( - previous issue - )

Apologia Report 12:44

December 7, 2007

Subject: Book of Mormon introductory pages get a telling tweak

In this issue:

ATHEISM - Publishers Weekly notices row over Antony Flew conversion

MORMONISM - initial reviews of Claiming Christ uncritically positive

+ Book of Mormon's official introduction changed regarding ancestry of American Indians

SCIENCE - First Things pans The Physics of Christianity

WORD-FAITH MOVEMENT - U.S. Senate Committee on Finance takes on prosperity-gospel purveyors

-------

ATHEISM

"Times Magazine Piece on Former Atheist Kicks Up Controversy" by Lynn Garrett, Religion BookLine editor for Publishers Weekly -- refers to the November 4 article in the New York Times Magazine, "The Turning of an Atheist" by Mark Oppenheimer which reviewed There Is a God: How the World's Most Notorious Atheist Changed His Mind by Antony Flew and Roy Varghese [1]. Garrett explains that "Oppenheimer characterizes Flew as a senile old man being manipulated and exploited by evangelical Christians for their own ends. (In the book, Flew does not declare himself a Christian, but admits to now believing in 'an intelligence that explains both its own existence and that of the world.')"

HarperOne publisher Mark Tauber complains that Oppenheimer "'went after the integrity of our author and our integrity. It seems like he just saw this as an opportunity to make a name for himself, and it was out of line.' The 84-year-old Flew has nominal aphasia Ñ a condition that affects his ability to remember names Ñ said Tauber, 'but Oppenheimer made the leap from that to senility and then implied that Flew didn't write the book.' Tauber pointed out that ghost-writing is a ubiquitous practice in publishing, and said that Flew had thoroughly reviewed the manuscript and signed off on it as accurately representing his views.

"HarperOne released a statement from Flew: 'My name is on the book and it represents exactly my opinions. I would not have a book issued in my name that I do not 100 percent agree with. I needed someone to do the actual writing because I'm 84 and that was Roy Varghese's role. The idea that someone manipulated me because I'm old is exactly wrong. I may be old but it is hard to manipulate me. This is my book and it represents my thinking.'" Publishers Weekly, Nov 14 '07, <http://www.publishersweekly.com/article/CA6501078.html>

Also see <http://tinyurl.com/2awgk5>.

---

MORMONISM

Claiming Christ: A Mormon-Evangelical Debate, by Gerald R. McDermott and Robert L. Millet [2] -- two brief reviews have turned up. In Booklist (Nov 1 '07, pp7-8), reviewer Bryce Christensen finds that the authors offer "compelling evidence that those who pursue such dialogue can develop respectful - even friendly - interfaith relationships without surrendering their own distinctive convictions." Christensen reports that "the nature of Christ and the contents of scripture clearly separate the Mormon Millet from the Evangelical McDermott on matters of deep theological significance. Indeed, in this book - more confrontational than its predecessors (How Wide the Divide? [3] and Bridging the Divide [4]) - Millet challenges McDermott's Trinitarian creed, and McDermott disputes the teachings attributed to Christ in the Book of Mormon."

Publishers Weekly (Sep 10 '07, n.p.) adds: "By concentrating solely on how both faiths address the identity and meaning of Jesus Christ (a topic Millet has previously discussed in A Different Jesus? [5]), this dialogue delves deeply into issues Robinson and Blomberg could only skim. It also means that this more scholarly and heavily footnoted book will be a challenging read for the average evangelical or Mormon who simply wants an overview of both religions' theology. The authors assume a familiarity with theological terms, Christian history and soteriological debates, and some of their explanations are highly technical. For the serious student, however, this in-depth doctrinal comparison of Mormonism and evangelical Christianity, written in a spirit of mutual respect, will be a treasure trove of information." Brief. <http://www.publishersweekly.com/article/CA6475261.html?nid=2287>

"Single word change in Book of Mormon speaks volumes" by Peggy Fletcher Stack -- reports that "The LDS Church has changed a single word in its introduction to the Book of Mormon, a change observers say has serious implications for commonly held LDS beliefs about the ancestry of American Indians. ...

"The book's current introduction, added by the late LDS apostle, Bruce R. McConkie in 1981, includes this statement: 'After thousands of years, all were destroyed except the Lamanites, and they are the principal ancestors of the American Indians.' "The new version, seen first in Doubleday's revised edition, reads, 'After thousands of years, all were destroyed except the Lamanites, and they are among the ancestors of the American Indians.' ...

"The change 'takes into account details of Book of Mormon demography which are not known,' LDS spokesman Mark Tuttle said Wednesday.

"It also steps into the middle of a raging debate about the book's historical claims.

"Many Mormons, including several church presidents, have taught that the Americas were largely inhabited by Book of Mormon peoples. In 1971, Church President Spencer W. Kimball said that Lehi, the family patriarch, was 'the ancestor of all of the Indian and Mestizo tribes in North and South and Central America and in the islands of the sea.'

"After testing the DNA of more than 12,000 Indians, though, most researchers have concluded that the continent's early inhabitants came from Asia across the Bering Strait.

"With this change, the LDS Church is 'conceding that mainstream scientific theories about the colonization of the Americas have significant elements of truth in them,' said Simon Southerton, a former Mormon and author of Losing a Lost Tribe: Native Americans, DNA and the Mormon Church [6]." Salt Lake Tribune, Nov 8 '07, <http://www.sltrib.com/ci_7403990>

---

SCIENCE

The Physics of Christianity, by Frank J. Tipler, a professor of mathematical physics at Tulane University [7] -- reviewer Stephen M. Barr complains: "Tipler has descended deep into the realm of bizarre speculation.

"That something had gone wrong became clear when Tipler published The Physics of Immortality in 1994 [8]. It sold well but was scathingly reviewed in Nature by the well-known cosmologist George Ellis, who called it a 'masterpiece of pseudoscience.' [See "Piety in the Sky," Nature 371:115, Sep 8 '94, <http://tinyurl.com/2avery>]

"His new book, The Physics of Christianity, is a mixture of The Da Vinci Code and X-Men. God, Tipler informs us, is the 'singularity' of the spacetime manifold at the Big Bang. Unless the universe stops expanding and recollapses into a Big Crunch or final singularity (which is none other than God the Father, by the way), other nastier kinds of spacetime singularities will appear and the universe will be destroyed - even worse, it will be rendered mathematically inconsistent. But the universe's expansion can only be halted if mankind colonizes the whole universe and annihilates most of the atoms in it by the so-called sphaleron process (which is actually something real).

"Jesus knew the secret of doing this - hence his power of dematerializing and rematerializing. Indeed, as a sort of genetic mutant (due to his virgin birth), this superpower was built into his body and is encoded in his DNA. By finding a sample of his blood (here the Shroud of Turin and the Knights Templar enter the story), we will decipher the code and quite literally save the universe.

"There is much more of the same sort. To call it pseudoscience is far too kind. It seems that a few Christians are taking these ideas seriously. The people at Doubleday must be laughing into their sleeves." First Things, Nov '07, p57.

---

WORD-FAITH MOVEMENT

"Going After the Money Ministries" by David Van Biema -- reports that Republican Senator Chuck Grassley, ranking member of the Senate Committee on Finance, has decided to go after Kenneth Copeland, Creflo Dollar, Benny Hinn, Eddie Long, Joyce Meyer and Paula White, "six televangelists who are part of an evangelical subculture known loosely as Prosperity gospel. ...

"Prosperity adherents believe the right thoughts and speech, along with giving to the church, will prompt divine repayment in this life, with a return as high as $100 on each dollar handed up. ... [M]any Christians find [the movement] theologically and ethically perverse. Prosperity dominates American religious TV, and millions of adherents send millions of dollars to preachers they have never met. For Grassley, this might be fine if the ministers put all the money back into their mission work. But his now famous question about Meyer's $23,000 commode suggests he questions the destination of her estimated $124 million annual take. He has asked for her real estate records, reminding her fellow Missourians of an extended duel she had with Jefferson County officials that resulted in her agreeing in 2005 to pay taxes on half of her $20 million headquarters." Other examples given in this brief story focus on Copeland and Dollar. Time, Nov 15 '07, n.p. <http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1684552,00.html>

For an even more eye-opening take on the investigation, see Integrity, Accountability and the Grassley Investigation by J. Lee Grady, editor of Charisma magazine: <http://tinyurl.com/3e53gc>. This was followed by an exchange between Grady and Paul Crouch, Jr. of the Trinity Broadcasting Network (TBN):

<http://www.charismamag.com/crouchrebuttal>

<http://www.charismamag.com/forums/viewtopic.php?t=1742>

-------

Sources, Monographs:

1 - There Is a God: How the World's Most Notorious Atheist Changed His Mind, by Antony Flew With Roy Abraham Varghese (HarperOne, November 2007, hardcover, 256 pages)

<http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0061335290/apologiareport>

2 - Claiming Christ: A Mormon-Evangelical Debate, by Gerald R. McDermott and Robert L. Millet (Brazos, November 2007, paperback, 224 pages) <http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/1587432099/apologiareport>

3 - How Wide the Divide? A Mormon and an Evangelical in Conversation, by Craig Blomberg and Stephen Robinson (IVP, 1997, paperback, 228 pages)

<http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0830819916/apologiareport>

4 - Bridging the Divide: The Continuing Conversation between a Mormon and an Evangelical, by Robert Millet and Gregory C.V. Johnson (Monkfish, November 2007, paperback, 160 pages)

<http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0976684365/apologiareport>

5 - A Different Jesus? The Christ of the Latter-day Saints, by Robert L. Millet (Eerdmans, 2005, paperback, 232 pages)

<http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0802828760/apologiareport>

6 - Losing a Lost Tribe: Native Americans, DNA, and the Mormon Church, by Simon G. Southerton (Signature, 2004, paperback, 280 pages)

<http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/1560851813/apologiareport>

7 - The Physics of Christianity, by Frank J. Tipler (Doubleday, 2007, hardcover, 336 pages)

<http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0385514247/apologiareport>

8 - The Physics of Immortality: Modern Cosmology, God and the Resurrection of the Dead by Frank J. Tipler (Anchor, 1997, paperback, 560 pages)

<http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0385467990/apologiareport>

--------

( - next issue - )