Open Canon: Scriptures of the Latter Day Saint Tradition, edited by Christine Elyse Blythe, Christopher James Blythe, and Jay Burton is a book that I loved reading. It is an anthology of essays focusing on the documents created and used as scripture in the broader tradition of religions that trace their roots to the early Latter Day Saint movement. The focus on the creation and reception of texts, the various branches of the Smith-Rigdon movement, and thoughts about texts that could be considered non-canonical scriptures are all right up my alley, and given the quality of research being presented, I devoured the whole volume.
One chapter that will likely stick with me is the chapter “Revelation, Scripture, and Authority in the Latter Day Saint Diaspora, 1840–1870” by Richard L. Saunders. In it, Saunders discusses a way to understand the fracturing and eventual coalescence of Latter Day Saint groups in the midwest outside of the group that chose ongoing loyalty to Brigham Young and the Quorum of the Twelve. Referring to the era as the “Latter Day Saint Diaspora,” Saunders describes how it was initially characterized by appeals to the same types of charismatic displays of divine power that Joseph Smith demonstrated rather than the more institutional/priestly focus of the Quorum of the Twelve. As each would-be prophet failed to live up to the hype in the long-term, many Latter Day Saints became disenchanted with charismatic prophets and began creating systems that continued the basic traditions of Mormonism while putting some limits on prophetic authority. For example the Church of Christ (Temple Lot) tended to emphasize the scriptures as the ultimate source of authority and weighed the actions of their church leadership based on those scriptures (which led Chrystal Vanel to describe them as “a solae scripturae Mormonism” in a different chapter). Meanwhile, the Reorganization tended to emphasize both the primacy of the Bible and democratic process as ways to limit charismatic authority in their movement. All around, this chapter gave me a better framework to understand the midwestern Mormon experience.
Another chapter that stood out to me was “Lucy Mack Smith and Her Sacred Text,” by Janiece Johnson. Until recently, I had never thought about Lucy Mack Smith’s history as a scriptural text, but between this chapter and Claudia L. Bushman’s chapter in The Expanded Canon: Perspectives on Mormonism and Sacred Texts, it feels like there is starting to be some movement towards treating it as non-canonized scripture in some quarters. It makes sense—Lucy Mack Smith’s work is one of the best sources to see into the Smith family history and (by extension) the development of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints. In that way, it resembles 1 Nephi in the Book of Mormon. She also wove scriptural paraphrases and quotes into the text throughout, linking it to the Book of Mormon and the Bible in significant ways. While I am doubtful that the institutional church will view it as scripture anytime soon, I gained a newfound respect for the history of Lucy Mack Smith through reading this chapter.
As a practicing Latter-day Saint of the Brighamite church, the chapters about our Doctrine and Covenants were also insightful, especially “Joseph Smith’s Letter from Liberty Jail: A Study in Canonization,” by Kathleen Flake. Sections 121–123 in the Doctrine and Covenants are excerpts from two epistles that Joseph Smith dictated in Liberty Jail and sent to Emma Smith and the Church. Flake examines the process that led these epistles to being edited and selections of them introduced to the official canon of the Church in the 1870s. She also suggested reasons for why the text remained important enough to gain canonical status, both through its means of making sense of suffering and its pointing out the way to a better future for the Church.
In reality, I could probably go through each chapter and describe why they were impactful, insightful, and interesting, but space does not allow it. In short, I highly recommend Open Canon: Scriptures of the Latter Day Saint Tradition, and will say that it is definitely going on my list of favorite books that I’ve read in 2024.
The canonization process for D&C 121-123 sets an interesting precedent, or maybe it’s better described as an ideal. Paul didn’t intend to write scripture with his epistles any more than Joseph Smith did in writing his letter from Liberty Jail. There’s plenty of inspired writing in both, but Christianity would be in a better place if Paul had had an Orson Pratt who went through his epistles a few decades after they were written and decided which parts should be canon and which should not.