The definition of a philosopher is a blind man in a dark room looking for a black hat which isn't really there. The definition of a theologian is somebody who finds it.

-Lord Byron, Michael Ruse, Dashiell Hammet, Ernest Gellner, Wendy Doniger

"It [the revelation extending priesthood to all worthy males] is a tremendous thing. It came as a result of great effort and prayer, anxious seeking and pleading. Anyone who does not think that is a part of receiving revelation does not understand the process." -Gordon B. Hinckley, interview with Ed Kimball on July 12, 1978

On my argument, the Book of Mormon must be regarded as neither historical nor unhistorical, but as non-historical. This is not to suggest that the events it records did not happen. On the contrary, it is to claim that it must be subtracted from the dichotomy of the historical/unhistorical because the faithful reader testifies that the events—rather than the history—recorded in the book not only took place, but are of infinite, typological importance. Any enclosure of the Book of Mormon within a totalized world history amounts to a denial of the book’s unique claim on the attention of the whole world. In the end, then, to take the Book of Mormon as either historical or unhistorical may be to miss the nature of the book entirely. Both positions in the debate about Book of Mormon historicity—whether critical or apologetic—are founded on a common, backwards belief. The historicity of the Book of Mormon is not in question. Rather, as Alma makes clear, it is the Book of Mormon that calls the historicity of the individual into question.

-Joseph M. Spencer, An Other Testament: On Typology, pg. 28

Dear darkening ground,
you've endured so patiently the walls we built,
please give the cities one more hour

and the churches and cloisters two.
And those that labor — let their toils
still hold them for another five hours, or seven,

before that hour of inconceivable terror
when you take back your name
from all things.

Just give me a little more time!
I just need a little more time.
Because I am going to love the things
as no one has thought to love them,
until they're real and worthy of you.

-Rainer Maria Rilke

Quiet friend who has come so far,
feel how your breathing makes more space around you.
Let this darkness be a bell tower
and you the bell. And as you ring,

what batters you becomes your strength.
Move back and forth into the change.
What is it like, this intensity of pain?
If the drink is bitter, turn yourself to wine.

In this uncontainable night,
be the mystery at the crossroads of your senses,
the meaning discovered there.

And if the world shall cease to hear you,
say to the silent earth: I flow.
And to the rushing water speak, I am.

-Rainer Maria Rilke

God speaks to each of us as he makes us,

then walks with us silently out of the night.

These are the words we dimly hear:

You, sent out beyond your recall,
go to the limits of your longing.
Embody me.

Flare up like flame
and make big shadows I can move in.

Let everything happen to you: beauty and terror.
Just keep going. No feeling is final.
Don't let yourself lose me.

Nearby is the country they call life.
You will know it by its seriousness.

Give me your hand.

Rainer Maria Rilke

I live my life in widening circles
that reach out across the world.
I may not complete this last one
but I give myself to it.

I have been circling around God, that primordial tower.
I've been circling for thousands of years
and still I don't know: am I a falcon,
a storm, or a great song?

Rainer Maria Rilke

Importantly, this idea--namely, that the Book of Mormon is evental--has been argued before, and by a non-Mormon.  Jan Shipps, in her study Mormonism: The Story of a New Religious Tradition, describes "the profound historylessness of early Mormonism," effected precisely by the appearance of the book of Mormon.  At some length, she analyzes that rupture in history, brough about for the believer: "Since [the Book of Mormon] was at one and the same time prophecy (a book that said it was an ancient record prophesying that a book would come forth) and (as the book that had come forth) fullfillment of that prophecy, the coming forth of the book of Mormon effected a break in the very fabric of history."  Latter-day Saints are thus, according to Shipps, "suspended between an unsusable past and an uncertain future," giving themselves to a "replication" (an evental resurrection) that amounted to an "experiential 'living though' of sacred events in a new age."  Mormons are, for Shipps, a thoroughly typological people.

I believe this analysis clarifies the problem of hte Book of Mormon's historicity.  On my argument, the Book of Mormon must be regarded as neither historical nor unhistorical, but as non-historical.  This is not to suggest that the events it records did not happen.  On the contrary, it is to claim that it must be subtracted from the dichotomy of the historical/unhistorical because the faithful reader testifies that the events--rather than the history--recorded in the book not only took place, but are of infinite, typological importance.  Any enclosure of the Book of Mormon within are totalized world history amounts to a denial of the book's unique claim on the attention of the whole world.  In the end, then, to take the Book of Mormon as either historical or unhistorical may be to miss the nature of the book entirely.  Both positions in the debate about Book of Mormon historicity--whether critical or apologetic--are founded on a common, backwards belief.  The historicity of the Book of Mormon is not in question.  Rather, as Alma makes clear, it is the Book of Mormon that calls the historicity of the individual into question.

Joseph M. Spencer, "An Other Testament: On Typology" pg. 28

It is perhaps this that is most deeply meant when Latter-day Saints speak--quite commonly--of the Book of Mormon as the "missionary tool for conversion."  It does not mean that scriptural texts are means to an end, but ends in themselves--or perhpas means without end.  It is a tool of conversion indeed, but the work of conversion is not therefore outside or beyond the task of reading the book; conversion is, rather, the work of reading the book itself, of reading the book in a certain way--on its own terms or in the way it itself prescribes.  The Book of Mormon thus comes, as every graceful thing does, announcing only itself.  It asks its reader nothing more than to read it, nothing more than to be converted in reading it.

Joseph M. Spencer, "An Other Testament: On Typology" pg. 27

“When it occurs to a man that nature does not regard him as important, and that she feels she would not maim the universe by disposing of him, he at first wishes to throw bricks at the temple, and he hates deeply the fact that there are no bricks and no temples.”

- Stephen Crane, "The Open Boat"

"Put in Almas own words, typology is a question of allowing a new thought to rework memory, so that it becomes possible to advance in the knowledge of God."

-Joseph M. Spencer, "An Other Testament" pg. xii

Although most likely influenced by the famous Epic of Gilgamesh, adopting such themes as the presence of a snake, a plant that grants a type of immortality, a focus upon human death and morality, and ht use of sexuality to siginify a type of rite of passage that transforms people from being animal-like into human beings, J has its own unique story to tell. Like the author of the Epic of Gilgamesh, J observed that human sexual behavior is different than the types of activities in which animals engage.  For J, humans possessed an advanced knowledge of sex unlike the animals, but very much like the gods.

-David Bokovoy, Authoring the Old Testament: Genesis - Deutoronomy, pg. 107

When reading the Garden story contextually, the "knowledge" that the fruit imparted in J's story, making the primordial couple "like gods," appears specifically linked with sexual awareness.  As the myth opens up, the man already possesses the basic attributes of knowledge and discernment.  Prior to eating the fruit, the man holds enough knowledge to recognize and name the animals Yahweh creates, and the man shows enough discernment to recognize that the woman proves fit for the role of a "helper."  Therefore, the knowledge that the primordial couple obtains in J's myth is not simply intelligence, for the man already possesses this attribute prior to  consuming the forbidden fruit.  The knowledge the couple gains is sexual awareness.

-David Bokovoy, Authoring the Old Testament: Genesis - Deutoronomy, pg. 105

My Bright Abyss - Christian Wiman

My God my bright abyss
into which all my longing will not go
once more I come to the edge of all I know
and believing nothing believe in this:

The only real cure for provincialism is not dictated by our awareness of the size and diversity of the human family alone, but also by our awareness of the staggering size and diversity of the more-than-human community of nature.

George B. Handley - Home Waters, pg. 42

George Handley - Environmentalism rehabilitates humanity

Whatever environmentalism seeks to be, it must not denigrate the uniqueness of human experience.  This is because environmental degradation is itself our own suicidal impulse.  And this self-destructiveness is not only an indifference to beauty but an intolerance for the bald fact that we are subject to death and dying.  We need to rehabilitate what it means to be human.  We cannot risk self-hatred.

George B. Handley - Home Waters, pg. xvi

B.H. Roberts - Revelation, Inspiration, and Church Admin.

There is nothing in the doctrines of the Church which makes it necessary to believe that [men are constantly under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit], even...men who are high officials of the Church.  When we consider the imperfections of men, their passions and prejudices, that mar the Spirit of God in them, happy is the man who can occasionally ascend to the spiritual heights of inspiration and commune with God!...
We should recognize the fact that we do many things by our own uninspired intelligence for the issues of which we are ourselves responsible...He will help men at need, but I think it improper to assign every word and every act of a man to an inspiration from the Lord.  Were that the case, we would have to acknowledge ourselves as being wholly taken possession of by the Lord, being neither permitted to go to the right nor the left only as he guided us.  there could then be no error made, nor blunder in judgment; free agency would be taken away, an the development of human intelligence prevented.  Hence, I think it a reasonable conclusion to say that constant, nevery varying inspiration is not a factor in the administration of the affairs of the Church; not even good men, though they be prophets or other high officials of the Church, are at all times and in all things inspired of God.  it is only occasionally, and at need, that God comes to their aid."

-B.H. Roberts, "Relation of Inspiration and Revelation to Church Government," Improvement Era 8 (March 1905): 362