An Argument for the Intellect Part 5: Theological Twinkies

I have been neglecting finishing this series. Usually I have been just sidetracked with some other reading or procrastinating because it has been a long time and I know this will require a refresher. But I am finally ready to finish.

I have heard it related that Heaven is like a grand library. Like the above picture, I can imagine wandering through the spacious halls with wonder and awe. The smell of books in the air and the quiet, almost sacred ambiance. Each area is lined with shelves to the ceiling, often made out of some dark wood like mahogany. Sometimes shelves are two stories tall, so tall that they need a wooden ladder to get to the top. Decorative themes are on display throughout. Beautifully sculpted statues, mosaics on domed ceilings, stained glass windows, and comfortable, inviting reading chairs. I love libraries. This is Heaven, in part, to me. It is a reservoir of knowledge. Books will not be the only learning source, but it illustrates my point well. The feel of these beautiful, old libraries is important. They remind me of the classic home study or family rooms. Bookshelves, chairs, sofas, centered around a hearth. The hearth actually represents the home altar, something I read about recently. I never thought of it in that light but it makes sense. There is something sacred about it and something missing when it is not present. It has been replaced by the TV which has the most prominent spot in the home. That may be telling of our society. But I digress. 

If Heaven is like a grand library, you may scoff at it. You may not even like it. It may sound boring. You may say to yourself, "that is not Heaven to me!" A person who has not read a single book would not feel comfortable there, they would be a fish out of water. What are they to do in such a place? Run for the exits? To feel at home in Heaven requires that we make our current homes heavenly. The call to action recently has been to make our homes sanctuaries, temples. Ancient temples were in fact libraries. Though temples now serve a more narrowed focus, and rightly so, the work of salvation is immense and we need all hands on deck. But the temple remains the Lord's university (sorry all you BYU fans 😉). However, our obligation to turn our homes into a sanctuary still stands. So what does this look like? I argue that, in part, it looks like a library. It is a sacred and peaceful repository of knowledge and a refuge from the storms of life. 

This part focuses on what scholars have to say on this subject. I will be pulling from various scholars and like the other articles, more could be said, much more. Elder B.H. Roberts said, "mental laziness is the vice of men, especially with reference to divine things. Men seem to think that because inspiration and revelation are factors in connection with the things of God, therefore the pain and stress of mental effort are not required; that by some means these elements act somewhat as Elijah's ravens and feed us without effort on our part."¹ We want the easy way out, we want the path of least resistance. To make our home heavenly, we must become heavenly ourselves. Gone are the days of virtue ethics, that is, unless we willingly bring them back.

Virtue ethics, that is, character development used to be a vital part of society. It is not my object to go into it too much, but as disciples of Christ we seek to emulate the Great Exemplar. We seek to develop His divine characteristics. We are made in the image of God, we are called upon to be His representatives. Throughout the ancient Near East typically only the Kings were considered to be made in the image of God. Arguing against this, Genesis states all of humankind are made in God's image. We are to take upon us the name of Christ, to walk in His footsteps, and be like Him in thoughts, words, and deeds, as King Benjamin put it. (Mos. 4:30) Or as Alma taught, "And now behold, I ask of you, my brethren of the church, have ye spiritually been born of God? Have ye received his image in your countenances? Have ye experienced this mighty change in your hearts?" (Alma 5:14) I think James Allen said it best in his book As a Man Thinketh, "A man is literally what he thinks, his character being the complete sum of all his thoughts."²

But what should we fill our libraries with and what does this have to do with my character? What we learn shapes us. What we surround ourselves with molds us. This is seen throughout society and the world. You can see it in different cultures, different groups of friends. It is for better or for worse. All of us have had bad friends, they influence us to do things we shouldn't do; maybe we were the bad friend, it doesn't matter. This is the type of shaping I am talking about. Our choices in entertainment, exercise, food, work, and even books shape us. Some of these are necessities, others fall under amusement and distract us from what we should be doing. 

Education has great freeing power. It can free the mind and the soul. Its power is only dammed by distraction or the quality of the educational material. Hence, theological Twinkies. Some of us have had a steady diet of fast food and Hostess cakes. Elder Holland taught: 

When crises come in our lives—and they will—the philosophies of men interlaced with a few scriptures and poems just won’t do. Are we really nurturing our youth and our new members in a way that will sustain them when the stresses of life appear? Or are we giving them a kind of theological Twinkie—spiritually empty calories? President John Taylor once called such teaching 'fried froth,' the kind of thing you could eat all day and yet finish feeling totally unsatisfied.³ 

That is where I am pulling my title from. We are filled but not nourished. Like I have done before, I will separate the scholars by heading.

Hugh W. Nibley

Ever since stumbling upon him on my mission, I have grown to love Dr. Hugh Nibley. I love the way he writes and speaks. Indeed, he can be hard to follow but that makes it fun! He assumes the reader will have the requisite knowledge and plows forward. He doesn't hold back one bit, which means either stopping and looking up what he is talking about or reading him multiple times. At first, I didn't understand many of his references, but over time I did. He makes grand connections which excite the mind, unless you cannot see what he is talking about. He has a tendency to make connections while leaving out the necessary steps in between for many to make the logical conclusion. However, my mind tends to think like that so I love it, but I can see how it is maddening to some. The real issue is he expects much out of his readers, and why shouldn't he? If all we do is dumb down the information without an increasing level of difficulty, we shouldn't be surprised when out pops a dull product. 

Think of the capacity we have for enjoyment. I lie on my bed and fret when I look up and see all the books on the wall there. There’s an Arabic book I would just love to read, but I don’t have time. I knock my head off trying to learn to read this stuff, and when I get to it I can’t use it because I am doing something else. All this stuff with Egyptian on it. I don’t have any time for that stuff. Well, it’s pretty sad, isn’t it, that you can’t begin to use it. There must be a reason for this. The solution must be found in other times and places because the time is too short here. We can’t play a game of baseball in three minutes or in a closet. We don’t have time enough in three minutes, and the closet doesn’t give us space enough. That’s the situation we are in here. We are time bound. We’re in a time box. We can’t move in any direction without bumping into something, but we don’t have time for that. Of course, we don’t have space for that either because we can’t think of everything at once. In this life we are condemned to concentrate always on one thing at a time. The rest, if you see it at all, makes just sort of a background, side issues, etc. You are aware of it, of course, but you concentrate on only on object and you concentrate...on the object you choose to. That makes this life a time of probation. That shows what the desire of your heart is. With the possibility of thinking a billion things, you prefer to think of one particular thing. You have judged yourself then. This is what I wanted among all these things.⁴ 

And Satan’s great job is to distract us, and we are easily distracted.

“Sin is waste. It is doing one thing when you should be doing other and better things for which you have the capacity. Hence, there are no innocent, idle thoughts. That is why even the righteous must repent, constantly and progressively, since all fall short of their capacity and calling.”⁵ We are always up against the wall and my, my, a bit of relaxation does look nice, but not with what is at stake. We must press forward as Nephi states. 

Why do people feel guilty about TV? What is wrong with it? Just this—that it shuts out all the wonderful things of which the mind is capable, leaving it drugged in a state of thoughtless stupor. For the same reason, a mediocre school or teacher is a bad school or teacher.⁶

We are in a time crunch. The more we recognize this, the more we are eager to fill it with treasures from heaven. But that isn't always the case. We have hard days, weeks, even months, and amusement takes us away from our troubles. We say to ourselves "a little bit of relaxation will be okay," and then one day passes by and we realize we just binged watched an entire show. I remember finding myself playing a new video game and 8 hours later I stop, not realizing how much time had passed. Then I feel this odd sense of malaise. I feel downright cruddy, why? I just wasted 8 hours of my day being in a thoughtless stupor.

We have so many grandiose ideas but when it comes to fulfilling them we procrastinate because it takes effort. It is only natural. We are built to conserve energy. Maybe we think we can put in a half day's labor and that will be enough. Not so! We are to weary out our days in service to the Lord. Quality results require quality effort. It cannot come from consuming Twinkies.

Not infrequently, Latter-day Saints tell me that they have translated a text or interpreted an artifact, or been led to an archaeological discovery as a direct answer to prayer, and that for me to question or test the results is to question the reality of revelation; and often I am asked to approve a theory or "discovery" that I find unconvincing, because it has been the means of bringing people to the Church. Such practitioners are asking me to take their zeal as an adequate substitute for knowledge; but...they refuse to have their knowledge tested. True, "it needs revelation to assist us, and give us knowledge of the things of God,' but only the hard worker can expect such assistance."...How many a Latter-day Saint has told me that he can understand the scriptures by pure revelation and does not need to toil at Greek or Hebrew as the Prophet and the Brethren did in the School of the Prophets at Kirtland and Nauvoo? Even Oliver Cowdery fell into that trap and was rebuked for it.⁷

This I have seen time and time again even in my own profession. I have had arguments with others on nutrition or some other medical topic. They often will cite a podcast, an article, or some video they watched for evidence. I am then tasked with dismantling it as the burden of proof now lies on me. I always cringe having to bring up my credentials as it makes me sound arrogant, but what am I left to say against such zeal? They are often overly zealous about a little bit of information they have received, but they lack the requisite knowledge to test the information for validity. Usually, the argument doesn't go very far and I have learned to stop having them. There is no point, it is like arguing with a wall. This is similar to what Nibley is talking about. We think we have the corner market on understanding the scriptures due to personal revelation and the Restoration, far from it. The Restoration certainly provides added insight, but we often misunderstand even it. 

Zeal is a huge problem and it is often overlooked. We often point out the means rather than the results, bragging about how many hours we did that or this. How many books or articles we have published. This of course comes in multiple forms, but Nibley addresses them all.

He wrote: 

We think it more commendable to get up at five a.m. to write a bad book than to get up at nine o'clock to write a good one--that is pure zeal that tends to breed a race of insufferable, self-righteous prigs and barren minds. One has only to consider the present outpouring of "inspirational" books in the Church that bring little new in the way of knowledge: truisms and platitudes, kitsch, and cliches have become our everyday diet.⁸ 

Back to the diet once again. I noticed the amount of "inspirational books" awhile back. That is all you see. When you get the Deseret Book catalog in the mail, the majority are those types of books. Why? Because that is what sells! This is not to disparage Deseret Book, I love them. Though I wish things were cheaper especially Hugh Nibley's books, but that is beside the point. You can walk into Barnes & Noble and find the same thing. I remember reading Nibley once about academic articles too. He had something similar to say that most articles were not original but rather critiques of other's work. He said that is how you make a name for yourself, by critically analyzing someone else's work. At least that is the way he saw it in his day. I don't know if it is the same today, but I wouldn't be surprised. Original work is difficult. That is also not to say we do not need critical analysis, we certainly do. 

Nibley was a tough critic himself though, he wouldn't hold back. He said this quoting people at BYU, thus illustrating another distraction that is all too common amongst Latter-day Saints: 

"I would like to spend my time thinking about such and studying them, but I cannot afford the luxury. I have to think about the really important business of life, which is making a living." Mixed priorities with the heart of the matter being "Do you have any money? You can have anything in this world with money." The Lord really means what he says when he commands us not think about these things; and because we have chosen to find this advice hopelessly impractical "for our times" (note that the rich young man found it just as impractical for his times!), the treasures of knowledge have been withheld from us.⁸

We don't have the time because we are too busy trying to make a name for us in this world, trying to make money.

I was sitting in my history class at LDS Business College when my teacher, Rhett James, asked a student a question about his career path. The student wanted to be a lawyer. Bro. James asked him why he wanted to be a lawyer. His response was for the money. What proceeded was a 30 minute lecture of how being motivated by money is wrong. I remember wishing I had popcorn because it was rather entertaining. The poor kid didn't see that coming. Yet we have devoted a lot of effort to that pursuit whether we recognize it or not. I saw it amongst many students in chiropractic college. We will expend every effort possible if it means making more money, but for the Lord? "The gospel is simple, what more do I need to give?" That is the usual response.

Anyone who is familiar with Hugh Nibley will know the path he took and he was all the better for it. And we will be too. 

Noel B. Reynolds

Dr. Noel Reynolds is an emeritus professor of political science at BYU, some of you may have heard of him before. He has similar things to say regarding theological Twinkies. He states: 

We are observing a widespread difficulty in distinguishing between sentimentalism and true spiritual experience. Too much of the literature used, seen, and quoted in the Church today is just sentimental trash which is designed to pull our heartstrings or moisten our eyes, but it is not born of true spiritual experience. The tendency of our youth to use sentimental stories in Church talks creates a culture of spiritual misunderstanding in which thinking and learning are discouraged....I feel that our failure to immerse these young people in the scriptures and other high quality literature makes them vulnerable to the cheap tactics of every moralistic movement which they encounter.⁹ 

I am sure this sounds familiar. I have often had a hard time with many of the Ensign articles because of it. I wish they had a section from scholars every month, at least one or two articles. This is not to say all sentimental stories have no worth, but it is our sole reliance on them that is the problem. 

I have listened to podcasts and been in meetings where people share that stories are their favorite part of any talk or lesson. The stories are what were meaningful to them. Though this may be true in some instances, I worry that we look forward to stories because they are entertaining. I worry that what we receive is usually too superficial. That it never soaks in deep into their bones and causes lasting change. The Gospel is a Gospel of change. 

Reynolds continues: 

Our spiritual immaturity can also be revealed through our tastes in books. I was dismayed on two separate occasions this past year as editors of major LDS publishing houses patiently explained to me that they are primarily interested in books which can either feature a well-known Latter-day Saint name as the author or are written on a very simple level and in such a way as to give people a warm, comfortable feeling without any challenging ideas. Anything more demanding of the reader, I was informed, will not sell well enough to justify publication....I could see they were only being candid with me.⁹

Like Nibley, Reynolds notes the lack of quality in our publications. Now this talk was given in 1981, but I don't think much has changed. The entire talk is wonderful, I encourage you to read or listen to it.

Dilworth B. Parkinson

Dr. Dilworth Parkinson was a professor of Arabic at BYU. I came across this talk rather recently and it has fast become a favorite of mine. As a professor of Arabic, he starts his address talking about trying to teach a language to adults. He says: 

To be perfectly honest, teaching a foreign language to adult learners is just about as frustrating as learning one is. We are a profession with an almost spectacular level of failure. Large numbers of bright-eyed, excited students enter our classes every semester, eager to "learn Arabic" or some other language, but despite our best efforts something doesn't click with a good percentage of those students, and they end up quitting at some point well shy of reaching their goal.¹⁰

Some of this, he states, is due to students not realizing that learning a language is not solely memorizing facts. However, you have to invest yourself in it. The difference he says is "knowing that" vs "knowing how." It is usually a slow and arduous process. The students who succeed are the ones who immersed themselves in it. Which means making mistakes, being frustrated, and trying and trying again. And then finally it will click.

He relates all this to riding a bike.¹⁰ Which is a great analogy. We cannot expect to ride a bike perfectly the first time. We cannot learn to ride by reading every book on the subject. We have to go through the arduous and often frustrating task of learning to ride. We will fall. We will scrape our knees, but by and by it will come to us. But it takes consistent regular effort. I think many of us realize this. Studying takes consistent daily effort if we are to master the material. The other scholars I quoted talked about this. We have to work hard and not give up. But Parkinson hits on another point that is equally important.

One of the clearest results of language teaching research is that when a student becomes satisfied with what he knows, when he feels he "knows the language," he almost immediately ceases to make progress. We call this the "returned-missionary syndrome." Missionaries become fluent and proficient in their language in a very limited sphere. Unfortunately, many of them decide somewhere deep within their souls that they know enough that they don't need to know any more. They come home and enter our classes and don't make progress; they already know enough.¹⁰ 

From here he turns this illustration to gospel learning. 

I would like to summarize the doctrine of "line upon line" in this way: Even after we receive a testimony of the gospel, our understanding of it is incomplete—according to Brigham Young, woefully so. Even after years of Primary and Sunday School classes, scripture reading, and missionary service, our understanding is still not perfect. However, like the returned missionaries in our language classes, many of us have the returned-missionary syndrome. They are fluent and they do know a lot and it is hard for them to imagine that there is something important about the language that they don’t know—even though the gulf separating them from what a native speaker of the language knows is deep and almost unbridgeable. Similarly, we feel that we know the gospel quite well, and it can be hard for us to imagine something about the gospel that we don’t know. We don’t expect there to be another hidden law of tithing waiting for us just around the corner or some as-yet-secret law of sacrifice. We’ve had at least 30 Sunday School lessons on faith, and we didn’t hear anything new in the last 20. What is there left to learn?¹⁰

We are far from being "native speakers" of the gospel. The gulf between us and Christ is immense. But yet we seem to want to say, "I have enough" or worse yet, "I know it all." We often end up saying to God, "We have received, and we need no more!" (2 Ne 28:27) This is a bit negative, but it doesn't make it not true. Sadly, it is very true. "And they shall turn away their ears from the truth, and shall be turned unto fables." (2 Tim 4:4) The sad thing is we believe the fables to be the truth, the revealed word of God sometimes. This is why we must consider what we believe. Is it backed up by the scriptures? If so, do we understand the scriptures correctly? If so, what evidence do you have that you are understanding it correctly? What do the Brethren say? These are not to make you doubt, but only to make sure you have a correct understanding. I thought I understood certain doctrines only to find out I partially understood or misunderstood altogether. I'm sure I will find many more points I didn't fully understand in the future!

Ben Spackman

Ben Spackman is finishing up his PhD at Claremont currently. He has a wonderful blog and I have quoted from him often. I think he is an underutilized resource and I hope more of his thoughts get out there. He is right in line with the Brethren, though I think many scoff at his ideas. I wonder if we would scoff at some of the things Hugh Nibley used to say. I am not sure we would because of who he is, sometimes we give allowance to some but not to others. Further, we often don't like our feathers to be ruffled. It's uncomfortable, but change is often uncomfortable. 

Speaking of theological Twinkies, Spackman states:

If we LDS are collectively having a spiritual diabetes epidemic, we are at least partially to blame. What is the solution? Real discipleship. Costly discipleship. Deep scripture study. Reading history instead of historical fiction. Moving beyond Primary-and Seminary-level understandings of Church history, doctrine, and scripture. Getting out of our comfort zones in loving our neighbors. In other words, "eating your vegetables."¹¹ 

In other words, nutritious reading. 

Concluding Remarks

Since my focus is on books and studying, I am calling it nutritious reading. The idea comes from a favorite website of mine run by Katy Bowman who is a biomechanist. It is called Nutritious Movement. She came up with the idea because we need a nutrient-dense diet to be healthy. So we need a daily intake of vitamins and minerals, not from supplements but from real food. She took that idea and applied it to movement. We often think of exercising once per day but what do we do with the rest of the day? We sit usually. She wanted to expand this idea of movement, to get in your daily nutrient-dense movements, your movement vitamins and minerals. So she created Nutritious Movement. Similarly, I am applying this idea to reading. 

We need to read. But not just read any old book. Rather, quality books that expand the soul. We need to become seekers after truth. A great book we just started listening to and are about halfway through is Seekers Wanted by Anthony Sweat. I highly recommend it. It is a book to own and loan out. A lot of great tips to increase our gospel study prowess. 

We need to get our daily allotment of spiritual vitamins and minerals. But not just in supplement form. We cannot just read a quote here or there. Proper nutrition is much more than its individual parts. Proper nutrition includes macro- as well as micro-nutrients. It includes phytonutrients, probiotics, prebiotics, variety, quality of foods, and so much more. The same goes with reading. It cannot be done at the spur of moment or at 4x speed. Studying a book is much more complex.

Richard J. Foster wrote, 

Studying a book is an extremely complex matter, especially for the novice. As with tennis or typing, when we are first learning it seems that there are a thousand details to master and we wonder how on earth we will keep everything in mind at the same time. Once we reach proficiency, however, the mechanics become second nature, and we are able to concentrate on our tennis game or the material to be typed. The same is true with studying a book. Study is an exacting art involving a labyrinth of details.¹²

I love that he uses the word labyrinth, the maze built by Daedalus for King Minos to house the Minotaur. The winding paths of the maze were so difficult to navigate that Ariadne gave Theseus a string so he could retrace his steps and make it out alive. That is studying and it can seem daunting at first, but once the tools are learned the labyrinth reveals its hidden treasures. Something Seekers Wanted can teach us.

So what do we fill our library with? What sorts of books? The best books, the scriptures teach us. What are the best books? The scriptures and anything that can teach you about the scriptures. From there, it depends on your interests. It could be history books, archaeology, paleontology, astronomy, geology, classical literature, contemporary literature, poetry, etc. A personal favorite of mine is fantasy. I have lots of fantasy books, but I balance those with what I deem to be more important books. The list goes on and on. We are just asked to seek, to strive, and to learn. The Lord wants us to become better, more loving, more like Him. 

This will not happen in an instant. Hugh Nibley taught, "The cure for knowledge is 'ever more light and knowledge.'"¹³ Elsewhere he said, "Can’t the Spirit hurry things up? No—there is no place for the cram course or quickie, or above all the superficial survey course or quick trips to the Holy Land, where the gospel is concerned...No shortcuts or easy lessons here!"¹⁴

What will expanding our home libraries, doing nutritious reading, and ultimately making our home a sanctuary do for us? As C.S. Lewis said, 

Imagine yourself as a living house. God comes in to rebuild that house. At first, perhaps, you can understand what He is doing. He is getting the drains right and stopping the leaks in the roof and so on: you knew that those jobs needed doing and so you are not surprised. But presently he starts knocking the house about in a way that hurts abominably and does not seem to make sense. What on earth is He up to? The explanation is that He is building quite a different house from the one you thought of-throwing out a new wing here, putting on an extra floor there, running up towers, making courtyards. You thought you were going to be made into a decent little cottage: but He is building a palace.¹⁵

Sources:

1. Roberts, Elder B.H., The Seventy's Course of Theology, Vol. V. (Salt Lake City: The Deseret News, 1912), pg. V.
2. Allen, James, As a Man Thinketh. (Mount Vernon, N.Y.: Peter Pauper Press, 1951)
3.  Holland, Jeffrey R. “‘A Teacher Come from God.’” The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/study/general-conference/1998/04/a-teacher-come-from-god?lang=eng.
4. Hugh Nibley, Teachings of the Pearl of Great Price. (Provo, UT: Brigham Young University, 2004), pg. 131.
5. Hugh Nibley, Nibley on the Timely and the Timeless. (Salt Lake City, UT: Publishers Press, 1978), pg. 264.
6. Ibid, pg. 264-265.
7. Ibid, pg. 269.
8. Ibid, pg. 271.
9. Reynolds, Noel B. “Reason and Revelation.” BYU Speeches, February 4, 2020. https://speeches.byu.edu/talks/noel-b-reynolds/reason-revelation/.
10. Parkinson, Dilworth B. “‘We Have Received, and We Need No More.’” BYU Speeches, February 4, 2020. https://speeches.byu.edu/talks/dilworth-b-parkinson/received-need/.
11. Spackman, Ben. “Theological Twinkies and Our Spiritual Diet.” Ben Spackman, September 11, 2019. https://benspackman.com/2019/08/11/theological-twinkies-and-our-spiritual-diet/.
12. Foster, Richard J. Celebration of Discipline: the Path to Spiritual Growth. (San Francisco: HarperOne, 2018), pg. 67.
13. Nibley, Nibley on the Timely and the Timeless, pg. 267.
14. Ibid, 268.
15. Lewis, C.S. Mere Christianity. (New York: Macmillan, 1952), pg. 174.