Episodes

This episode continues our special series of episodes on the Maxwell Institute’s brief theological introductions to the Book of Mormon. In his book on Mosiah, philosopher and theologian James E. Faulconer untangles a complicated narrative—a fragmentary history about a fragmented people, written by a record keeper obsessed with unity. Faulconer unpacks what King Benjamin had in mind in speaking of the “mysteries of God.” About the Guest James E. Faulconer is a professor of philosophy at Brigham ...

We live in an age of polemics. Choices are presented as mutually exclusive and we are given little time to listen. You are either secular or religious. You either believe in the exclusive truth of your own religion or you believe that truth is everywhere—or nowhere. The battle over truth rages on. But what if truth were a child? What if we pursued a relationship with the truth and each other in more caring ways? Dr. George Handley joins us in this episode to talk about his book, If Truth Were a...

This episode continues our special series on the Maxwell Institute’s Brief Theological Introductions to the Book of Mormon. Literary scholar and theologian Sharon J. Harris investigates the messy middle era between the genesis of the Nephite people and their reorganization under King Benjamin. What keeps things—relatively—together through Enos, Jarom, and Omni? Harris uncovers the personalities, concerns, and patterns of righteousness and wickedness that are often overlooked in these short books...

The post Briefly Jacob, with Deidre Green [MIPodcast #103] appeared first on Neal A. Maxwell Institute | BYU.

February 14, 2020 marks the 150th anniversary of Utah women first exercising the right to vote, and the 100th anniversary of the 19th Amendment to the United States Constitution being ratified, granting voting rights to many women in the United States—but not all of them. Women’s suffrage is a complicated and fascinating history about how women gained the vote, lost that right, and then fought to get it back again. This episode features the authors of Thinking Women: A Timeline of Suffrage in U...

For centuries, Christians have celebrated Mary as the miraculous virgin and Mother of God. Catherine Taylor suggests a much richer history of traditions about Mary, much closer to the experiences of Christian women down through the ages. These traditions aren’t found in the Bible. We’ll need to look at other texts and ancient artifacts—burial boxes, jewelry, art. Catherine Taylor specializes in late antique Christian art history and iconography and joins us to talk about women of the ancient wor...

Get behind the scenes of the Maxwell Institute Podcast in this special interview celebrating one hundred episodes. Jeremy King, the Maxwell Institute’s administrator and controller, invited host Blair Hodges to talk about how the show is made and what he hopes it offers to listeners. About the Guest Blair Hodges is the public communications specialist at the Maxwell Institute. He earned a bachelor’s degree in mass communication with a minor in religious studies from the University of Utah in 20...

This episode continues our special series of episodes on the Maxwell Institute’s brief theological introductions to the Book of Mormon. Terryl Givens is author of the volume on what many readers consider to be the most challenging part of the scripture—Second Nephi. The authors of our Brief Theological Introductions are “seeking Christ in scripture by combining intellectual rigor and the disciple’s yearning for holiness.” About the Guest Terryl L. Givens is a Neal A. Maxwell Senior Research Fel...

“I, Nephi, having been born of goodly parents...” So begins the first book in the Book of Mormon. First Nephi. And this is the first episode in a special series of interviews with authors of the Maxwell Institute’s forthcoming “Brief Theological Introductions to the Book of Mormon. Twelve different authors tackle twelve different parts of the book, and Joseph M. Spencer of Brigham Young University was given the task of approaching First Nephi. Learn more about the Brief Theological Introductio...

Maxwell Institute Conversations are special episodes of the Maxwell Institute Podcast, hosted by Terryl Givens and created in collaboration with Faith Matters Foundation. Audio and video available. Is faith a choice? Does faith come naturally to some more than others? Terryl Givens and Rosalynde Welch have written and spoken on these questions, and each of them bring interesting perspectives to the discussion. About the Guest ROSALYNDE FRANDSEN WELCH is an independent scholar in St. Louis, Mis...

When Latter-day Saint apostle Elder Jeffrey R. Holland visited Oxford University in England last year, he became fast friends with Reverend Dr. Andrew Teal of Pembroke College. The two of them hit it off so well that Elder Holland invited Dr. Teal to Utah to attend General Conference for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, and to visit Brigham Young University. Rev. Teal spent some time at the Maxwell Institute where he sat down with Blair Hodges to talk about his life as a chaplain...

One of the most outspoken critics of Chairman Mao’s cultural revolution was a young poet and journalist named Lin Zhao. She was a Christian convert, then a member of the Communist Party, then an enemy of the state who paid for her opposition with her life. She was executed by firing squad. And her story would have vanished—along with the lives of some two million other Chinese who were killed during the cultural revolution—but she left a record. She wrote her witness in her own blood. In this ep...

This bonus episode feature Spencer Fluhman delivering his 2019 BYU Women’s Conference address, “Answering Sincere Questions about the Gospel of Jesus Christ.” It also features an announcement about the Institute’s forthcoming series about the Book of Mormon, Brief Theological Introductions. Originally presented on May 2, 2019. The post “Answering sincere gospel questions,” with Spencer Fluhman [MIPodcast #95] appeared first on Neal A. Maxwell Institute | BYU.

Almost fifty million people in the United States live with some type of physical or intellectual disability. That’s one in five. In this special episode, twelve distinguished guests—scholars, organizers, religious leaders, writers—join us to talk about how we can create communities of belonging where people with disabilities and everyone else can feel welcome. This panel discussion took place during the Summer Institute on Theology and Disability at Hope College. Learn more about disability re...

When you think about the earliest Christians you might imagine the twelve disciples, like Peter and John. Maybe Paul comes to mind. But what about women in early Christianity? What drew them to a life of discipleship and what did they bring to the community and the church as it began to spread? Few people have spent as much time thinking about these questions as Dr. Carolyn Osiek, co-author of A Woman’s Place: House Churches in Earliest Christianity. Osiek visited BYU’s Maxwell Institute earlie...

Maxwell Institute Conversations are special episodes of the Maxwell Institute Podcast, hosted by Terryl Givens and created in collaboration with Faith Matters Foundation. Audio and video available. Samuel Brown deals in matters of life and death every day. He’s a doctor working in a Shock/Trauma ICU. In his spare time, he’s also a theologian and a historian of Latter-day Saint thought. In this interview with Terryl Givens, Brown talks in his own unique style about the ways of discipleship. Abo...

Joseph Smith left a lot of documents behind when he died in 1844, from the mundane to the intriguing. Some of the more puzzling documents deal with a book of scripture in the Latter-day Saint canon called the Book of Abraham. Said to be translated from ancient papyrus, the scripture broadens the story of the Hebrew Bible’s figure of Abraham. Where did the papyrus come from? What do modern Egyptologists have to say about it? And what do these documents suggest to Latter-day Saint historians abou...

In this episode, historian Tisa Wenger of Yale University joins us to talk about religious freedom—the legal right to worship according to the dictates of a person’s own conscience. An important ideal to be sure, but—as historians like Wenger are fond of saying—it’s complicated. We’re talking about her new book Religious Freedom: The Contested History of an American Ideal. About the Guest Tisa Wenger is Associate Professor of American Religious History in the Divinity School, American Studies,...

Maxwell Institute Conversations are special episodes of the Maxwell Institute Podcast, hosted by Terryl Givens and created in collaboration with Faith Matters Foundation. Audio and video available. Thomas Wirthlin McConkie was born into a prominent American Latter-day Saint family, but the faith didn’t resonate with him as a teenager. He disconnected from the Church and began exploring the wider world’s faith traditions. He followed a thread through eastern religion and philosophy, then was sur...

We’re extremely excited that the Maxwell Institute Study Edition of the Book of Mormon has finally been published. We see it as a watershed moment in the history of Latter-day Saint scripture publishing. It’s the first study edition ever published by a church affiliate, and it includes new formatting, useful footnotes, original artwork, and more. Editor Grant Hardy and artist Brian Kershisnik join us to talk about the new edition and all the work that went into it, on this episode of the Maxwel...

According to historian Colleen McDannell, women have played vital roles in the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints from the beginning. From the hard-scrabble pioneer worker to the Progressive Era suffragette, from the domestic housewife to the working mother, the international convert, the single adult, the black Latter-day Saint—each have contributed to the church’s development and growth in their own important ways. In this episode Dr. McDannell introduces us to many of these women wh...

Many believers live their entire lives without learning much about other people’s religion. Maybe some people avoid interreligious dialogue because they think they already know their religion is true. Maybe some people fear that such exchanges might somehow change them and they don’t want change. In this episode we’re joined by Catherine Cornille. She’s a Catholic theologian at Boston College and an enthusiastic supporter of interreligious dialogue. We’re talking about her book, The Impossibili...

Maxwell Institute Conversations are special episodes of the Maxwell Institute Podcast, hosted by Terryl Givens and created in collaboration with Faith Matters Foundation. Audio and video available. A lot has changed for Thomas Wayment since this he sat down for this conversation with Terryl Givens. At the time, Thom was a professor of ancient scripture working on a new translation of the New Testament intended for Latter-day Saints. Now he’s teaching classical studies and his translation has be...

William Bickerton was a coal miner from England who emigrated to the United States and joined the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in 1845. Without ever having met the church’s founding prophet, he soon came to see himself as Joseph Smith’s true heir, leading what came to be called simply The Church of Jesus Christ, but more commonly referred to as the Bickertonites. Despite founding the third largest church tracing its lineage back to Joseph Smith, Bickerton’s biographer Daniel P. S...